Question

While driving his pickup truck, Joe stops at a red light. When the light turns green, Joe steps on the gas

and accelerates to 16 m/s in 4 seconds. What is Joe's acceleration?

Answer 1

Answer: Acceleration = 4 m/s^2

================================================

Work Shown:

The values we're working with are

`v_i = 0 = \text{ initial velocity}\\\\v_f = 16 = \text{ final velocity}\\\\t = 4 = \text{ change in time}\\\\a = \text{ unknown } = \text{ acceleration}\\\\`

We'll plug those into the kinematics formula below to solve for 'a'

`v_f = v_i + a*t\\\\16 = 0 + a*4\\\\16 = 4a\\\\4a = 16\\\\a = (16)/(4)\\\\a = 4\\\\`

Joe's acceleration is 4 m/s^2

This means that every second, Joe's velocity is increasing by 4 m/s.

---------------------------

To check our answer, we can see that

Time 0 = Velocity 0

Time 1 = Velocity 4

Time 2 = Velocity 8

Time 3 = Velocity 12

Time 4 = Velocity 16

This confirms our answer.