PP1 (Shorter) Quant Section 2 (Hard) Q14

<p><span style="color:#27ae60;"><span style="font-size:20px;">Solving the Problem</span></span></p> <p>We&#39;re given a function and asked to find suitable value $t$, such that putting $2t$ into the function outputs $30$.</p> <p><strong>Method 1 (Algebra)</strong></p> <p>First, let&#39;s make the problem a bit less intimidating by changing $2t$ to something easier, in this case $a$:</p> <p>$a = 2t$</p> <p>So, $f(2t) = f(a) = a^2 + a$</p> <p>So, now we can solve for a value of a that makes this function equal to $30$:</p> <ul> <li>$a^2 + a = 30$</li> <li>$a^2 + a - 30 = 0$</li> </ul> <p>Since we have a quadratic equation here, we just need to solve it with any standard method. This one is pretty straightforward to factorize:</p> <ul> <li>$a^2 + a - 30 = 0$</li> <li>$(a + 6)(a - 5) = 0$</li> </ul> <p>So, we know that $a + 6 = 0$ OR $a - 5 = 0$, so, we can deduce that $a = -6$ or $a = 5$.</p> <p>However, we should remember that $a = 2t$, since we are looking for values of $t$, we have to halve these. So, $t = -3$ or $t = \frac{5}{2}$.</p> <p><strong>Method 2 (Back Solving)</strong></p> <p>Since we only have 5 answer choices here, we can also backsolve to find suitable values for t:</p> <table border="1" cellpadding="1" cellspacing="1" style="width:500px;"> <thead> <tr> <th scope="col">$t$</th> <th scope="col">$2t$</th> <th scope="col">$f(2t)$</th> <th scope="col">Is $f(2t)=30$</th> </tr> </thead> <tbody> <tr> <td>$-5$</td> <td>$-10$</td> <td>$(-10)^2+(-10) = 90$</td> <td>No</td> </tr> <tr> <td>$-3$</td> <td>$-6$</td> <td>$(-6)^2+(-6)=30$</td> <td>Yes</td> </tr> <tr> <td>$-\frac{1}{2}$</td> <td>$-1$</td> <td>$(-1)^2+(-1)=0$</td> <td>No</td> </tr> <tr> <td>$2$</td> <td>$4$</td> <td>$(4)^2+(4)=20$</td> <td>No</td> </tr> <tr> <td>$\frac{5}{2}$</td> <td>$5$</td> <td>$(5)^2+(5)=30$</td> <td>Yes</td> </tr> </tbody> </table> <p>As we can see, the only suitable values for $t$ are $-3$ and $\frac{5}{2}$.</p> <p>So, the only valid answers are <span style="color:#27ae60;">B</span> and <span style="color:#27ae60;">E</span>.</p>