BETTMAN, PAYNE WIN PRESTIGIOUS PRIZE

James R. Bettman, the Burlington Industries Professor and director of the Ph.D. program, and John W. Payne, the Joseph J. Ruvane, Jr. Professor and deputy dean at Fuqua, were selected by the editors of the Journal of Business at the University of Chicago to receive the Leo Melamed Prize for outstanding scholarship by professors in business schools.

Bettman, Payne and Mary Frances Luce, formerly a Ph.D. student at Fuqua and now a faculty member at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, received the prize in recognition of their paper, "Constructive Consumer Choice Processes." The paper appeared in the December 1998 issue of the Journal of Consumer Research. The Journal of Business editors noted that the paper "develops the idea that references for options of any complexity are constructed, possibly on the spot, in decision making contexts ... and lays out a research agenda for continuing work on this promising model of consumer decision making."

The Leo Melamed Prize was established by the University of Chicago to recognize the most significant research done by business school faculty members in all fields at universities other than the University of Chicago. The prize is awarded every two years and carries with it a citation, a medal and an honorarium. The prize was established in 1978 to honor Leo Melamed, the chairman of the Chicago Mercantile exchange and a pioneer in modern financial practice.

In addition, Bettman was recognized by the American Marketing Association for his outstanding contributions to the field of marketing. Every year one marketing academic is selected by his peers to receive this award. The AMA/Irwin Distinguished Marketing Educator Award is awarded annually to the educator who is an innovative teacher and researcher and who best serves the marketing profession through his administrative and public service work.