The number of significant digits of any measurement is determined by the instrument used for such measurement. For example, in this case, we have the height of a small child being measured. We can use a simple ruler for this, and we see that a ruler has ten divisions for 1 cm. This means that the ruler cannot measure beyond the size of 0.1 cm or 1 mm. Hence, when we report the height of the small child, we report it to one significant digit after the decimal place. As an example, if we measure a child's height to be 90 full cm divisions and 8 smaller divisions, we report it as 90.8 cm but not 90.83 or 90.86 cm.
