Skip to Content Go to sign in Skip to Primary Navigation Skip to Secondary Navigation Skip to Page Navigation Skip to Header Navigation Skip to Footer Navigation Read more about accessability options and our navigation

Physics Classroom is making strides to make our site accessible to everyone. Our site contains 6 navigation areas. The Primary, Secondary, and Page Level navigations have a screen reader version of their nav structure that allows using the left and right keys to navigate sibling navigation items, and up or down keys to navigate parent or child navigation items. The others can be navigated using tabs. The Primary Navigation handles the first 2 levels of site pages. The Secondary (which is not always available) handles the 3rd and 4th level of structure. The Page level navigation allows you to navigate the current page's headings quickly. The Header Navigation contains the Light/Dark Mode toggle, Search, Notifications and account login. The Breadcrumb Navigation contains the breadcrumb of the current page. If the current page has a breadcrumb, you can get to it by skipping to the content and tabbing in reverse (shift plus tab). The Footer Navigation contains links such as Privacy, Contact, about and terms. Some resources contain an Audio Player that can be activated by holding down the T key for 3 seconds, and then using K to pause and resume. While not every area of Physics Classroom is usable purely from keyboard and screen reader, we are committed to continue work on making this possible. If you have questions or need additional help, please use this link to contact us.

Return to screen reader navigation
Home Minds On Newton's Laws Mission NL7 Newton's Second Law Help Help 9

Mission NL7 Newton's Second Law

The Question

An object has an acceleration of 12.8 m/s/s. If the net force experienced by the object is increased (or decreased) by a factor of 2.5 and if the mass of the object is increased by a factor of 3.3, then the new acceleration would be ...

(Note: Numbers are randomized numbers and likely different from the numbers listed here.)

Physics Rules

Newton's Second Law
The acceleration of an object as produced by a net force is directly proportional to the magnitude of the net force, in the same direction as the net force, and inversely proportional to the mass of the object.

Formula Fix

The relationship between net force (Fnet), mass (m) and acceleration (a) is expressed by the equation
 
a = Fnet/ m

Minds On Time

To be successful on this question, you will have to think about the meaning of the statement: the acceleration of an object is directly proportional to the net force that it experiences and inversely proportional to its mass. Whatever change is made in the net force, the same change will be made to the acceleration. So if the net force is increased by a factor of 2, the acceleration will be increased by a factor of 2 (that is, multiplied by 2). And whatever change is made in the object's mass, the oppositechange will be made to the acceleration. So if the object mass is increased by a factor of 3, the acceleration will be decreased by a factor of 3 (that is, divided by 3). Thus two changes will have to be made to the original acceleration value - it will have to be multiplied or divided by two different factors.

Take your time and think it through - that's what Minds On is all about.

Hot Link