Solve Problems Involving Addition, Subtraction, Multiplication and Division 4 - Reasoning

Tia has made a common error in her approach to solving the problem of how many men are at the concert. She correctly starts by subtracting the number of extra women (7,800) from the total number of people in attendance (73,534), leaving her with 65,734. This figure represents the combined number of men and the same number of women, as the initial difference has been removed. However, Tia incorrectly assumes this to be the final answer, overlooking the crucial step of dividing this number by 2 to find the individual count for men.

The correct method involves the additional division step after subtraction. Once the number of extra women is subtracted, the remainder must be divided equally to find the number of men, as there are now an equal number of men and women. Therefore, the calculation should be (73,534 – 7,800) ÷ 2, which equals 32,867. This is the correct number of men at the concert. Tia's mistake was to stop at subtraction and not complete the division, which led to a misunderstanding of the problem and an incorrect answer.