Problem 1E Find the locations and values of all relative extrema for the functions with graphs as follows. Compare with Exercise in the preceding section.
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Textbook Solutions for Calculus with Applications
Question
Problem 55A
Attitude Change Social psychologists have found that as the discrepancy between the views of a speaker and those of an audience increases, the attitude change in the audience also increases to a point but decreases when the discrepancy becomes too large, particularly if the communicator is viewed by the audience as having low credibility. Suppose that the degree of change can be approximated by the function
D(x) = –x4 + 8x3 + 80x2,
where x is the discrepancy between the views of the speaker and those of the audience, as measured by scores on a questionnaire. Find the amount of discrepancy the speaker should aim for to maximize the attitude change in the audience. Source: Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.
Solution
The first step in solving 5.2 problem number 55 trying to solve the problem we have to refer to the textbook question: Problem 55AAttitude Change Social psychologists have found that as the discrepancy between the views of a speaker and those of an audience increases, the attitude change in the audience also increases to a point but decreases when the discrepancy becomes too large, particularly if the communicator is viewed by the audience as having low credibility. Suppose that the degree of change can be approximated by the functionD(x) = –x4 + 8x3 + 80x2,where x is the discrepancy between the views of the speaker and those of the audience, as measured by scores on a questionnaire. Find the amount of discrepancy the speaker should aim for to maximize the attitude change in the audience. Source: Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.
From the textbook chapter Relative Extrema you will find a few key concepts needed to solve this.
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