Question

one fifth of the movie audience left the theater in disgust. If 72 angry patrons walked out how many were there originally

Answer 1

360 members.

Explanation:

One fifth (
`(1)/(5)`) of the movie audience left the theater. Let the total number of audience be x. Then according to the statement
`(1)/(5)` of x audience members left the theater.

We are also told that the number of audience members which walked out was 72. So this means, One-Fifth of the audience members(x) is 72. In equation form we can write this as:

`(1)/(5) x =72`

Multiplying both sides by 5, we get:

`x=72 * 5\\x=360`

This means, there were originally 360 members in the audience before 72 of them walked out.