Question

How do you find the 50th term in the sequence 122, 114, 106, 98?

Answer 1

-278

Explanation:

We are given four pieces of a pattern. Let's first figure the pattern out, and then apply it 46 more times to find the 50th term.

First I check the differences between numbers when attempting to discover the pattern in a set of numbers. Then I compare the differences to see how they differ.

Applying this concept to the current set of numbers I noticed that the difference between the first two numbers is 8 (`122-114`), then 8(`114-106`), then 8 (`106-98`) again.

From this one can draw the conclusion that this pattern repeats of subtracting 8 from the resulting number.

So now we want to find the 50th term. We could subtract 8 from 122 50 times or we could solve `122-8*50`

Solving this you would get -278