Illustrating dimensionless scaling with Hooke's law

Abstract

Dimensionless variables and scalings are powerful tools for emphasising the universality of natural laws, but their application is typically restricted to topics in advanced physics. Here we describe how dimensionless scaling can be illustrated in an introductory physics context by considering a dimensionless form for Hooke's law. As a simple empirical study, we verify this form for Hooke's law using data from foundation-year degree (high-school level) experiments on springs in series and parallel.