Question icon
Grade 12th passMechanics

You have most likely had a experience of standing in an elevator that accelerates upward as it moves toward a higher floor. In this case, you feel heavier. In fact, if you are standing on a bathroom scale at the time, the scale measures a force magnitude that is greater than your weight. Thus, you have tactile and measured evidence that leads you to believe you are heavier in this situation. Are you heavier?

Profile image of Attiya Imran
5 Years agoGrade 12th pass
Answers icon

1 Answer

Profile image of Harshit Singh
5 Years ago
Dear Student

No, your weight is unchanged.
Your experiences are due to your being in a non-inertial reference frame.

To provide the acceleration upward, the floor or scale must exert on your feet an upward force that is greater in magnitude than your weight.

It is this greater force you feel, which you interpret as feeling heavier.




Thanks