Perhaps we are having some miscommunication here. I don't know if the original poster was making a precise statement when they said "hundreds and hundreds of hours" anyway.
I haven't watched any of these videos in a while so I don't remember which ones are good, and it's a lot to go through, sorry about that. But there are some accounts here of people who have followed "mostly-input" style methods. I don't think any of them are 100% passive input though, and I'm not sure anybody argued that is the best way to do it.
I also seem to remember a study I found recently on whether uncomprehensible input works for language acquisition with very interesting results, but I cannot find it right now.
>spending 7,000 hours of passive "experiencing" would be a hugely inefficient way to learn a language
The efficiency really depends on if it's something you want to do or not, but I don't know if anybody is doing a full 12 hours a day (maybe some super hardcore people). I believe it's closer to 6, maybe 8 hours if you're very serious about it and have the time.
>learning anything requires some effort/active practice
Yes, you need to actually try to understand what you're listening to at least part of the time, maybe most of the time, which means you need to be actually interested in the content, otherwise you will get bored quickly. But passive listening while you are doing other things definitely helps in combination with active study.
I'm not sure if we're using "passive" in the same way though. Actively focusing on, and trying to understand what you are listening to isn't what I'd call passive.
>Could you provide a reference to these studies or accounts? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pxYZvMByRjU&list=PLT9cfjU1yk...
I haven't watched any of these videos in a while so I don't remember which ones are good, and it's a lot to go through, sorry about that. But there are some accounts here of people who have followed "mostly-input" style methods. I don't think any of them are 100% passive input though, and I'm not sure anybody argued that is the best way to do it.
I also seem to remember a study I found recently on whether uncomprehensible input works for language acquisition with very interesting results, but I cannot find it right now.
>spending 7,000 hours of passive "experiencing" would be a hugely inefficient way to learn a language
The efficiency really depends on if it's something you want to do or not, but I don't know if anybody is doing a full 12 hours a day (maybe some super hardcore people). I believe it's closer to 6, maybe 8 hours if you're very serious about it and have the time.
>learning anything requires some effort/active practice
Yes, you need to actually try to understand what you're listening to at least part of the time, maybe most of the time, which means you need to be actually interested in the content, otherwise you will get bored quickly. But passive listening while you are doing other things definitely helps in combination with active study.
I'm not sure if we're using "passive" in the same way though. Actively focusing on, and trying to understand what you are listening to isn't what I'd call passive.