Sonya Lim

Sonya Lim serves as Professor of Finance and Director of the Driehaus Center for Behavioral Finance within the Department of Finance & Real Estate at DePaul University's Driehaus College of Business. Her leadership extends to directing research initiatives focused on behavioral aspects of financial decision-making.

Her educational background includes a PhD in Finance from The Ohio State University (2003), an MS in Management Engineering from Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (1998), and a BS in Electrical Engineering from the same institution (1995). These interdisciplinary foundations inform her research approach.

Lim's research centers on behavioral finance phenomena, with emphasis on investor psychology, market inefficiencies, and household financial decisions. Her work examines how cognitive biases affect analyst forecasts, trading behavior, and debt management. Key contributions include studies on reference point adaptation across cultures, attention-driven market misreactions, and the role of trust in financial contracts. This research program bridges experimental psychology with empirical market analysis.

Her publication record demonstrates consistent output in top-tier journals including the Journal of Finance, Management Science, and Review of Financial Studies. The research trajectory shows evolving focus from early work on option pricing and corporate hedging toward behavioral household finance and cross-cultural analyst behavior, reflecting growing scholarly interest in psychological drivers of market outcomes.

As Director of the Driehaus Center for Behavioral Finance, Lim oversees initiatives that connect academic research with practical financial applications. The center serves as a hub for interdisciplinary collaboration between finance scholars, psychologists, and industry practitioners focused on understanding real-world financial decision-making.