jmc

Let the original area be $x$. Since the area of the rectangle is length multiplied by width, increasing the length of a rectangle by 25 percent increases the area to $1.25x$. We need to multiply this area by some number $y$ to decrease it back to $x$. We have the equation $1.25xy=x\Rightarrow y=1/1.25=.8$. So the width needs to be decreased to $.8$ times of the original in order to change the area back to the original area. Thus, the width needs to be adjusted $\boxed{20}$ percent.