The Chief Examiner reported that candidates performed well in this question. Majority of the candidates were reportedly able to express the right hand side of the equality sign as a single log i.e. f(y) = log2 (y+ 1) – log2 (y + 3) = log 2(). However, candidates should know that f(y) would not exist when () is less than or equal to zero and this would happen when -3 £ y £ -1. Therefore, the domain of f(y) was Doman(f) = y : y R, y < -3 and y > -1 A good number of the candidates were reported not to get this right.
In part (b), candidates were reportedly able to show that if f(y) = 1, then log2 () =
log22 i.e. = 2. By cross multiplying and bringing like terms together, we obtain
y = - 5.