Awards

Households face myriad challenges when it comes to making financial decisions. These challenges often stem from a combination of economic factors, behavioural biases, and a lack of information or education. Behavioral Finance Insights aims to inform the financial industry and regulators to create better decision environments for households to improve their financial capacity. The BFIG aims to finance experimental research of young researchers to understand behavioral underpinnings, ultimately allowing us to improve financial decision competence in households.

Do you want to contribute to better behavioral finance insights? Then apply for the Behavioral Finance Insights Grant (BFIG).

The newly founded Behavioral Finance e.V. (link) and the Society for Experimental Finance award €4,000 (plus free participation at the 2024 EF for one author) for the best research proposal using experimental finance methodology to understand behavioral insights.

Please submit your research proposal using an adjusted pre-registration form, which you can download here.

We invite you to submit your submission form to office@experimentalfinance.org with the subject “BFIG24".

A panel of experts will evaluate the papers and select the winner. The panel members are Camelia Kuhnen (University of South Carolina), Nobuyuki Hanaki (Osaka University), Christine Laudenbach (Goethe University) and Stefan Palan (University of Graz). 

The deadline for submitting proposals is April 15, 2024. We will announce the winners in May.

We are looking forward to receiving your nominations!

For further questions, don't hesitate to contact Sascha Füllbrunn via office@experimentalfinance.org. 

(published 19 May 2025)

We call for nominations for the annual Vernon L. Smith Excellence Award (VSEA) in Experimental Finance.

The Society for Experimental Finance and Chapman University will award a US$2000 prize for the best article published in 2023 using the "Experimental Finance" method. We invite the author to present this article at EF2024 in Stavanger, Norway.

We invite you to nominate a peer-reviewed article published in 2023—the publishing date must be the in-print date! Please email your nomination to office@experimentalfinance.org with the subject “VSEA24”.

A panel of experts will evaluate the papers and select the winner. The panel members are Camelia Kuhnen (University of South Carolina), Nobuyuki Hanaki (Osaka University), Christine Laudenbach (Goethe University) and Stefan Palan (University of Graz). 

The deadline for submitting a nomination is April 01, 2024.

We are looking forward to receiving your nominations!

For further questions, don't hesitate to contact Sascha Füllbrunn via office@experimentalfinance.org. 

(published 19 May 2025)

In 2023, the Society for Experimental Finance awards two times $4,000 for the best research proposals in finance using experimental methodology. We thank Chapman University for sponsoring the prize in 2023. We awarded only one prize so far (see below) and was open for a second round. The deadline was September 30th, 2023. To apply for the VSYA, one needs to submit a proposal for an experimental research project via the application form, and send the completed application form to office@experimentalfinance.org with the subject “VSYA” and the applicant's name.  

Requirements

• The following holds for all authors. Your project is eligible for assessment if 1) you have received your PhD after 2017 or have no PhD yet, 2) you have an affiliation with a University or other research institution, and 3) and you are a SEF member. (Membership in the SEF is free; visit https://bit.ly/sef-member to join.)

• Your project’s research question is located in a finance context, for example, financial economics, corporate finance, household finance, or sustainable finance.

• Your proposal should describe a proper experiment, with a minimum of two treatments organized as a randomized control trial (no quasi-experiment, comparing two distinct groups of participants exposed to the same stimuli, and no demonstration, comparing outcomes from one environment/task to theoretical benchmarks).

• The funds are earmarked for running the submitted experimental project. Any resulting publication must acknowledge funding from the SEF through the VSYA.

Find more information in the application form.

How to find the winner for the second round? After screening the submissions for eligibility, we send part two of the application form to the panel members. The panel members evaluate the proposals and select the winner. The panel members are Elena Asparouhova (SEF Current President), Michael Kirchler (SEF Founder), Stefan Palan (SEF Managing Director) and David Porter (Chapman University Ambassador).

We are pleased to announce that Cary Frydman (USC Marshall) and Lawrence J. Jin (Cornell University) won the 2023 Vernon L. Smith Excellence Award in Experimental Finance for their paper "Efficient Coding and Risky Choice", published in the Quarterly Journal of Economics (https://doi.org/10.1093/qje/qjab031).

The award panel is excited about this important contribution to the study of perception in finance. The panel members are Elena Asparouhova (University of Utah), Michael Kirchler (University of Innsbruck), Dave Porter (Chapman University), and Stefan Palan (University of Graz).

Congratulations to both authors for their contributions!

We are pleased to announce that Jakob Famulok and Daniel Worring (both University of Frankfurt) won the 2023 Vernon L. Smith Young Talent Award in Experimental Finance for their research proposal "Moral Licensing through ESG Investments: Causal Evidence on Individual Preferences and Actions".

The award panel is confident the research project funded by this award will make an important contribution to the rapidly growing literature studying ESG investments and its sustainability impact. The panel members are Elena Asparouhova (University of Utah), Michael Kirchler (University of Innsbruck), Dave Porter (Chapman University), and Stefan Palan (University of Graz).

Congratulations to both winners!