The Academy of Financial Services (AFS) has announced the winners of its academic awards for research papers submitted for its annual meeting held Oct. 15-16th in Orlando, Fla. This year the Academy present four best paper awards selected from submissions made by many of the 100 researchers at the conference.

The Best Paper Award in Analytical Excellence, sponsored by Lindsay, Ont.-based PlanPlus Inc., was given to Diane Del Guerico, of the University of Oregon, Egemen Genc of Erasmus University and Hai Tran from Loyola Marymount University, for their paper entitled Playing Favorites: Conflicts of Interest in Mutual Fund Management.

The Best Paper Award for Behavioral Finance, sponsored by FinaMetrica, was given to Tao Guo and Michael Finke of Texas Tech University for their paper entitled Do Ants Turn Into Grasshoppers? The Habit of Thrift and Retirement Spending.

The Certified Financial Planner Board of Standards, Inc. (CFP Board) sponsored the Best Paper Award for Financial Planning. This award was given to Vickie Bajtelsmit and Jennifer Coats of Colorado State University. Their paper was entitled Overconfidence, Optimism, and Risk Management Decisions.

The award for Best Paper in Retirement Income Planning was sponsored by The American College. The winners of this award were James DiLellio of Pepperdine University and Dan Ostrov of Santa Clara University for their paper entitled An Exact, Optimal Strategy for Traditional vs. Roth IRA/401(k) Consumption During Retirement.

All winning papers will be considered for an expedited review for publication in the Financial Services Review, the official journal of the AFS, which is co-published with FPA. Financial Services Review is a quarterly journal publishing the latest theoretical and empirical research in financial planning and services.