Question

For the following questions, refer to the position versus time graph above.a. What is the object's velocity att = 5 s? (2 sig figs)b. What is the object's velocity at t=40s? (2 sig figs)

Answer 1

We are given a graph of position vs time. We are asked to determine the speed at 5 seconds. To do that we need to determine the slope of the line above the time point of 5 seconds. To determine the slope of the line we will use the following formula:

`m=(y_2-y_1)/(x_2-x_1)`

This means that we need to choose two points in the line. We use the graph to determine these points as follows:

The points we have chosen are:

`\begin{gathered} (x_1,y_1)=(0,0)_{} \\ (x_2,y_2)=(10,5) \end{gathered}`

Replacing in the formula for the slope we get:

`m=(5-0)/(10-0)`

Solving the operations:

`m=(5)/(10)=(1)/(2)`

Therefore, the speed at 5 seconds is 0.5 meters per second.

For part B the following points can be taken: