Question

A spring balance is graduated on sea level. If a body is weighed with this balance at consecutively increasing heights from earth's surface, the weight indicated by the balance:

• A. Will go on increasing continuously
• B. Will go on decreasing continuously
• C. Will remain same
• D. Will first increase and then decrease

Answer 1

The correct option is B Will go on decreasing continuously

We know weight of a body, $W=mg$ where,
$m$ is mass of the body and $g$ is the acceleration due to gravity.
Also $g=\frac{GM}{R^2}$, where,
$G$ is the universal gravitational constant, $M$ is the mass of the Earth and $R$ is the distance between the centre of the body and the centre of the Earth.
As the height of the body from Earth's surface increases, $g$ decreases.
Therefore, the weight as measured by spring balance will decrease continuously.