Question

Heather’s work to find the distance between two points, R(-3,-4) and S(5,7), is shown:What error, if any, did Heather make?

Answer 1

Answer

$d=185\approx13.60$

If Heather did something different from the procedure below, obtaining a different result, then she made something wrong while solving.

Explanation

To find the distance between two points, we have to make use of the following formula, where d is the distance, and (x₁, y₁) and (x₂, y₂) represent the coordinates from two given points:

$d=\sqrt{(x_1-x_2)^2+(y_1-y_2)^2}$

In our case:

• x₁ = –3

,

• y₁ = –4

,

• x₂ = 5

,

• y₂ = 7

Then, replacing the values we get:

$d=\sqrt{(-3-5)^2+(-4-7)^2}$$d=\sqrt{(-8)^2+(-11)^2}$$d=\sqrt{64+121}$$d=\sqrt{185}$$d=\sqrt{185}\approx13.60$