Algebra Equation Assistance

Question

You have 4 friends who do not have pets. Some of your friends have cats. There are twice as many dog owners than cat owners. One of your friends has a fish. The number of friends with dogs and fish is equal to the number of friends with cats or no pets. How many friends own cats?

Answer 1

Dustin,

When building an algebraic equation you need to assign values to each of the variables

you have a value for no pets - 4

you do not know how many dogs or cats, but you do know why the number of dogs is different than the number of cats so you call cats X

there are twice as many dogs than cats so you call dogs 2X

you are told that the number of fish is 1

so here are your values for each

no pets cats dogs fish

4 X 2X 1

you are then told that dogs and fish are equal to cats and no pets

therefore: 2X + 1 = x + 4

Do you know how to take it from here?