Final answer:
To estimate the number of teaspoons of sugar consumed, one must know that one teaspoon of sucrose contains 16 Calories, and there are 4.1 Calories per gram of sucrose. With this, if the 12-ounce soft drink contains approximately 36 grams of sugar, drinking one and a half of these would result in consuming about 14 teaspoons of sugar.
Step-by-step explanation:
If a student drinks a 12-ounce soft drink with 160 calories and then refills the cup halfway and drinks that, we need to calculate how many teaspoons of sugar have been consumed. To start, we must understand that a teaspoon of the carbohydrate sucrose (common sugar) contains 16 Calories (16 kcal). Given the density of calories for carbohydrates is 4.1 Calories/g, we can calculate the mass of one teaspoon of sucrose as follows:
16 kcal per teaspoon / 4.1 kcal/g = approximately 3.9 g per teaspoon
Next, we need to find out how much sugar in grams is in the 12-ounce soft drink. We're not given this information directly but can use a similar drink as a reference. If Beverage A has a mean amount of sugar of 36 grams, we might estimate that a typical soft drink of this size contains around 36 grams of sugar.
When you drink half of your 12-ounce soft drink for the refill, you've consumed a total of 1.5 times the original drink, which would be about 1.5 * 36 grams = 54 grams of sugar.
Now, if we divide these 54 grams by the grams per teaspoon (3.9 g), we get approximately:
54 g / 3.9 g/teaspoon = about 13.85 teaspoons of sugar
Therefore, you have consumed approximately 14 teaspoons of sugar after drinking one and a half 12-ounce soft drinks.