Question

The exponent indicates how many times the blank is used as a factor

Answer 1

The answer is base.
The exponent indicates how many times the base is used as the factor.
Base is the number that is multiplied many times as the exponent say so.
For example:
=> 5^7, where 5 is called the base and 7 is the exponent.
Meaning the base number which is 5 needs to be multiplied 7 times.
=> 5 x 5 x 5 x 5 x 5 x 5 x 5
=> the answer is 78 125

Answer 2

For this case suppose that we have an expression of the form:
 $a ^ b$
 Where
 a: base of the expression
 b: exponent of the expression
 For example, for a = 2 and b = 3 we have:
 $2 ^ 3 = (2) (2) (2)$
 We observe that the base of the expression is used as a common factor of the expression the number of times that the exponent indicates.
 Answer:
 The exponent indicates how many times the base is used as a factor