Is it really this uncommon for people to study before buying stocks?

I have an alumni library card at my university, which at any given time has over 4,000 students and is growing. I checked out an investments book, How Stocks Work by David L. Scott. It was published in 2002.

In the six years since it has been available, it has been checked out by three people. The first in 2002, the second in 2005, and just a few days ago, by me. For all our society's obsession with investing 3 people checked out this book in 6 years.

I just finished reading Rich Dad, Poor Dad. The author said that people don't learn first before doing anything. He was right.

I learned a lot about investing in university. however I rarely borrowed a book - most of the time I just read them in the library. I took a few classes in capital market theory and corporate finance.

You might want to check into Rich Dad, Poor Dad. Apparently the author is being slammed as a sham. The advice is correct. However the background story is mostly fiction.

Most people these days do their research on stocks and investing on-line. There are dozens and dozens of reputable and reliable free sources for investment information.

I don't know of anyone who would go to the library and check out a book on investing. By the time the book goes to press, the information would be obsolete, other than a few hard and fast rules of investing that you can find anywhere.

No
But there are so many resourses available now
not many depends on books but eBooks, internet and webs
Thats why you found like that for a book in library of a university of a perticular city

You can go to a local library and try to find
"Beating the Street"- "One Up on Wall Street" both by Peter Lynch
"How to Money in Stocks"- William O'Neill
"The Discipline Trader" Mark Douglas
"The warrn Buffett Way" - Robert Hogstrom
"Trading for A Living" - Alexander Elder
"What Works on Wall Street" - James O'Shaugessey
Try reading some investing web sites - Yahoo Finance or MSN Money
Good luck

Yes.

But as far as trading and investing in stocks go, studying does not necessarily prepare you to make money.

In fact, study probably increases it very little if at all.

There's basically two classes of knowledge on Wall Street. Inside knowledge and everything else.

The everything else is worthless. This includes almost any investment book you can find at the library.

The inside knowledge is either not published, or it's completely out of the league for most people.

For example, skim through the book "Dynamic Hedging" by Nassim Taleb. You can look at sample pages from this book online at amazon.com.

Out of your league, right?