[poll id=”58″]
ANSWER: B. 28.5
When giving an acceleration graph (velocity over time), displacement is simply the area under the graph (or above the graph if the line extends into the negative y-axis, which in this case, it does not). The best way to approach this problem is to break the line graph apart into squares and right triangles to determine the area of each component and add them up for the total area (displacement).
You can break this into 7 different sections that you can use to calculate the area easily:
#1 = (1/2)(bh) = (1/2)(1)(2)=1
#2 = (lw) = (2)(4)=8
#3 = (lw) = (2)(2)=4
#4 = (1/2)(bh) = (1/2)(2)(3)=3
#5 = (lw)=(5)(2)=10
#6 = (1/2)(bh)=(1/2)(1)(5)=2.5
Adding the areas up: 1+8+4+3+10+2.5 = 28.5