when you increase the length of each side of a square by 20% does the area increase by exactly 40% less than 40% or more than 40%

The area of a square is calculated by squaring the length of one of its sides. Therefore, when you increase the length of each side of a square by 20%, the new side length will be 120% (100% + 20%) of the original side length.

Let's assume the original side length is 1, for simplicity.
After increasing each side by 20%, the new side length becomes 1 * 1.20 = 1.20.

The original area of the square is 1 * 1 = 1.
The new area of the square is 1.20 * 1.20 = 1.44.

To find the percentage increase in area, we can calculate:
(1.44 - 1) / 1 * 100 = 44%.

Therefore, when you increase the length of each side of a square by 20%, the area increases by more than 40%, specifically by 44%.