A mother and her small child are standing in an inflatable bouncy house on opposite sides. The mother jumps up and comes back down again, transferring her kinetic energy to the child through the floor. How will the motion of the small child change?

Question

The child will move up at a faster speed because the child has less mass.
The child will move up at the same speed at which the mother came down.
The child will move up at a slower speed because the child has less mass.
The child will move down at the same speed at which the mother came down.

Answer 1

The child will move up at the same speed at which the mother came down. This is based on the conservation of energy principle, which states that energy cannot be created or destroyed but can only be transferred from one form to another. When the mother jumps and comes back down, her kinetic energy is transferred to the child and the inflatable bouncy house. The child will then also move up with the same amount of kinetic energy that the mother had when she jumped, resulting in the child reaching the same height as the mother did. The mass of the child does not affect the speed at which the child moves up or down, as long as there are no external forces acting on the system.