Question

A student determined the heat of fusion of water to be 88 calories per gram if the accepted value is 80 calories per gram, what is the students percent error?

Answer 1

The answer is 10%

The percent error is used to determine the precision of calculations. It can be expressed as:
$e = \frac{v-v_{1} }{v_1} *100$
where:
e - the percent error,
v - experimental value (measured value),
v₁ - theoretical value,

It is given:
e = ?
v = 88 calories
v₁ = 80 calories

Thus, the percent error is:
$e = \frac{88-80}{80}*100 = \frac{8}{80}*100=0.1*100=10%$