DaveBee wrote:Books and audio-books provide a lot more words-per-hour than modern television. If your objective is to get a lot of L2 input, books, written or audio, are more efficient.
This "input" is not a shipment of potatoes. TV programs deliver more of the stuff per hour of input if you're after certain words and constructions.
While there are books that contain colloquialisms etc. TV programs are a richer source of this type of language. The sentences are shorter (has anyone tried counting sentences per minute? ) there are more questions, the pronouns are used more often etc.
Some statistics:
Subtlexus vs the Brown corpus (TV fiction vs reading)
Word frequency per million words of running text (number of recurrences):
This 7,979 vs 5,146
Now 3,202 vs 1,314
Was 5,654 vs 9,815
In 9,773 vs 21,345
Out 3,865 vs 2,096
Me 9,242 vs 1,183
My 6,763 vs 1,319
Mine 251 vs 59
Can 5,247 vs 1,772
Will 2,124 vs 2,244
Would 1,768 vs 2,715
There 4,348 vs 2,725
But 4,418 vs 4,381
By 1,340 vs 5,307
He 7,637 vs 9,542
Him 3,484 vs 2,619
So 4,244 vs 1,985
Go 3,793 vs. 626
Goes 217 vs 89
Going 2,123 vs 399
Went 411 vs 507
Gone 297 vs 195
Like 3,999 vs 1,290
Likes 76 vs 20
Liked 79 vs 58
How 3,056 vs 836
If 3,541 vs 2,199
Just 4,749 vs 872
Get 4,583 vs 749
gets: 223 vs 66
Got 3,306 vs 482
Had 1,676 vs 5,131
Come 3,141 vs 630
comes 229 vs 137
came 464 vs 622
Coming 527 vs 174
They 4,102 vs 3,619
See 2,557 vs 772
saw 403 vs. 352
seen: 385 vs 279
Let 2,419 vs 384
Did 2,341 vs 1044
From 2,039 vs 4370
Want 2,759 vs 329
Wants 307 vs 71
Wanted 502 vs 226
Think 2,691 vs 433
thinks 103 vs 23
Thought 809 vs 516
thinking 281 vs 145
Take 1,891 vs 611
Took 342 vs 426
Taken 281 vs 139
Look 1,947 vs 399
looks: 311 vs 78
looked 121 vs 361
Some 1,727 vs 1,617
Then 1,490 vs 1,377
Why 2,248 vs 404
Where 1,830 vs 938
Too 1,372 vs 833
More 1,299 vs 2,216
Down 1,490 vs 895
Yes 1,997 vs 144
Tell 1,724 vs 268
Little 1,446 vs 831
Thing 1,088 vs 333
Mean 1,244 vs 199
Said 1,109 vs 1,961
Sure 1,100 vs 264
First 840 vs 1361
Put 829 vs 437
Please 1,101 vs 62
Wildlife 2 vs 19
Father 555 vs 183
Mother 480 vs 216
English 74 vs 195
hasn't 91 vs 20
Tuesday 24 vs 59
January 7 vs 53
Economical 0.33 vs 22
Arrested 35 vs 19
Run 350 vs 217
Court 101 vs 230
Office 204 vs 255
Planet 39 vs. 21
Planets 4 vs 22
Political 22 vs 258
Theoretical 2 vs 21
...
The importance of literature.
DICKENS, NCFWD, BROWN and SUBTLEXUS compared (Frequency per million words)
Brown: frequency rank number in parentheses. The Brown corpus contains 1,014,312 words sampled from 15 text categories. NCFWD = classic fiction.
Man
Dickens 2037
NCFWD 1587
Brown 1210(no 81)
SUBTLEXUS: 1099
Old
Dickens 1973
NCFWD 1335
Brown: 660 (no. 140)
SUBTLEXUS: 609
Hand:
Dickens 1289
NCFWD 871
Brown: 431
SUBTLEXUS: 280
Head
Dickens 1212
NCFWD 616
Brown: 404 (no 201)
SUBTLEXUS: 371
Face
Dickens 1075
NCFWD 765
Brown 371 (no 245)
SUBTLEXUS: 289
Dear
Dickens 1284
NCFWD 790
BROWN 54 (no 2040)
SUBTLEXUS: 223
LADY
Dickens 834
NCFWD 1284
BROWN: 80 (no 1328)
SUBTLEXUS: 217
Door
Dickens 986
Ncfwd 614
BROWN 312 (no 295)
SUBTLEXUS: 292
Manner
dickens 547
ncfwd 285
BROWN 124 (no 831)
SUBTLEXUS: 12
Child
Dickens 538
Ncfwd 338
BROWN 213 (no 435)
SUBTLEXUS: 158
Seemed
Dickens 535
Ncfwd 569
BROWN 332 (no 274)
SUBTLEXUS: 54
Yet
Dickens 590
Ncfwd: 864
BROWN 419 (no 202)
SUBTLEXUS: 342
Let
DICKENS 656
NCFWD 726
BROWN: 384 (no 231)
SUBTLEXUS: 2,419
Half
Dickens 618
Ncfwd 580
Brown 275 (no 337)
SUBTLEXUS: 199
Love
Dickens 420
Ncfwd 775
Brown 232 (no 397)
SUBTLEXUs: 1,115
Returned
Dickens: 846
NCFWD 264
Brown: 115 (return: 180)
SUBTLEXUS: 25 (return: 92)
Replied
Dickens: 823
NCFWD: 299
Brown: 57 (reply: 42)
SUBTLEXUS: 1 (reply: 5)
Slowly
Dickens: 178
NCFWD: 117
Brown 115 (no.900) slow: 60 (no.1817)
SUBTLEXUS: 25 slow: 76
Softly
Dickens: 101
NCFWD: 36
Brown: 31 (no. 3425)Soft: 62
SUBTLEXUS: 5 Soft: 1126
Hastily
Dickens: 87
NCFWD: 45
Brown: n/a not in the top 5,000 (less than 19)
SUBTLEXUS: 1 (haste: 2)
Gently
Dickens: 83
NCFWD: 59
Brown: 31 (no.3441) Gentle: 27
SUBTLEXUS: 9 Gentle: 17
Quietly
Dickens: 78
NCFWD: 85
Brown: 48 (no.2250) Quiet: 76
SUBTLEXUS: 12 Quiet: 117
Carefully
Dickens: 65
NCFWD: 56
Brown: 87 (no.1213) Careful: 62 care: 162
SUBTLEXUS: 24 Careful: 109 Care: 485
Heartily
Dickens: 54
NCFWD: 26
Brown: not in the top 5,000
SUBTLEXUS: 1
Steadily
Dickens: 47
NCFWD: 19
Brown: 22 (no 4499) Steady: 41
SUBTLEXUS:: 1 Steady: 23
Frequently
Dickens: 42
NCFWD: 52
Brown: 91 (no.1146) Frequent: 34
SUBTLEXUS: 3 Frequent: 2
Thoughtfully
Dickens: 39
NCFWD: 5
Brown: not in the top 5,000; neither is thoughtful (less than 19)
SUBTLEXUS: 1 Thoughtful: 8
Eagerly
Dickens: 37
NCFWD: 49
not in the top 5,000 Eager: 27 (no. 3772)
SUBTLEXUS: 1 Eager: 7
Freely
Dickens: 35
NCFWD: 24
Brown: 22 (no 4476) Free: 260 (no.358)
SUBTLEXUS: 4 Free: 178
Happily
Dickens: 32
NCFWD: 27
Brown: 20 (no 4836) Happy: 98 (no1069).
SUBTLEXUS: 10 Happy: 333
Sharply
Dickens: 31
NCFWD: 25
Brown: 38 (no.2827) Sharp: 72
SUBTLEXUS: 1 Sharp: 24
Sternly
Dickens: 26
NCFWD: 12
Brown not in the top 5,000 Stern: 23 (no.4295)
SUBTLEXUS: 0.1 Stern 6
Timidly
Dickens: 26
NCFWD: 19
Brown not in the top 5,000 (neither is “timid”)
SUBTLEXUS: 0.1 Timid: 2
Source: my own research
It's no secret that if you watch documentaries or news you will run into many instances of words like "wildlife, " "political", "theoretical" and "planet", the sentences will look and feel different etc.
"In a script, there are approximately 125 words of dialogue per minute. This estimate is based upon recent American films. The words of dialogue per minute might range from 50 to 200 within a script."
Online source. TV scripts will have their own characteristics.
In addition to the differences between the types of content, the differences in how the brain processes language material become critical for foreign language learners. Numerous factors may interfere with second language listening comprehension and the skill takes time to develop.