In the newspaper today there is a mensa brainteaser, I tried to guess what the answer was but i'm not too sure, I've done it lots and lots of times different ways and came up with two different numbers, but knowning me neither are probably right so I'd appreciate it if someone here could tell me the answer and how you got it as it's driving me crazy,thanks

What number is missing in this sequence?

1, 2, 2, 4, ? ,32, 256, 8192

Each number is 2 raised to a power.

1 is 2 to the power of 0;
2 is 2 to the power of 1;
2 is 2 to the power of 1;
4 is 2 to the power of 2;
32 is 2 to the power of 5;
256 is 2 to the power of 8;
8,192 is 2 to the power of 13.

Each power is the sum of the previous two powers (is this what’s called a Fibonacci sequence or something like that?)

So the missing number is, I think, 8 (2 to the power of (1 + 2)).

thanks TabbyTom

At least now I know

TabbyTom, I can confirm that this sequence is indeed called the Fibonacci Sequence.

While doing research for creating a quiz on this topic some time back, I came across this page, which I highly recommend giving a read.