I do a small school projects on writers (who work in the academic research fields). I was wondering about how professional freelance writers expand their knowledge and skills; do they continue learning while working at the same time? Or they just become freelancers and don't need to learn anything any more? My idea is that the majority of writers actually stopped learning at school and they only learn something new when they work on specific assignments. They don't need to expand their skills once they learned different referencing styles or after they have completed their first dissertation (and followed the structure of a dissertation, ie. dissertation chapters). And that they spend a lot of time reading for pleasure but not for knowledge (that is they read only when they have to but they aren't interested in expanding their knowledge beyond what is required in the assignment). In other words, they are like crafts people and do the minimum to make their customers happy. Nothing surprising about that. What's your position on the topic?