What is the perpendicular slope of 3?

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Answer 1 · 2018-03-21T19:04:57

$-1/3$

Perpendicular slopes are opposite reciprocals of each other.

Opposites: negative versus positive

3 is a positive number; therefore, its perpendicular slope must be negative

Reciprocals: multiplicative inverse (the two reciprocals must multiply to 1)

The reciprocal of 3 is $1/3$ (to find a reciprocal: flip the numerator and denominator)

$3/1 rarr$ The numerator is 3, the denominator is 1

$1/3 rarr$ The numerator is 1, the denominator is 3

$3*1/3=1$