You can search for stocks with strong dividends or you can let fund managers do it for you (for a fee). The latter option is getting popular; late last fall, according to Lipper, investors began putting more money into dividend-oriented funds, even as they continued to yank money out of other stock funds. Below, three funds that suffered last year but have had strong track records.

Parnassus Equity Income (PRBLX)

2008 ranking: Top 2 percent
Five-year ranking: Top 1 percent
Annual expenses: $99 per $10,000 invested

More than 80 percent of this socially responsible fund s holdings pay dividends. Manager Todd Ahlsten thinks the nation is in for a long, messy recession, so he has been filling his fund with stocks of everyday businesses whose goods and services will continue to be relevant despite economic woes. Holdings include trash haulers (Waste Management), health care conglomerates (Johnson & Johnson) and a technology juggernaut (Microsoft). Ahlsten was down 23 percent last year but still handily beat most of his peers and the broader stock market. The fund is among the best-performing large-company core mutual funds over the past one-, three-, five- and 10-year periods, according to Morningstar, and it attracted about $750 million in net inflows of new assets from investors in 2008.

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2008 ranking: Top 15 percent
Five-year ranking: Top 15 percent
Annual expenses: $69 per $10,000 invested

Fund manager Tom Huber made big bets on financial stocks last year and lived to tell the tale. It s almost as important what you don t own as what you own, says Huber, whose focus on balance-sheet risk and management teams steered him away from Lehman Brothers and Bear Stearns and toward US Bancorp and insurance brokerage Aon. His 33 percent loss, while painful, put him ahead of the S&P 500 and most large-cap managers. The sometime polo player looks for firms likely to gain market share and come out stronger after the recession. In the meantime, he says, I m getting paid to wait with yields of 2 to 4 percent, which doesn t sound bad right now.

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2008 ranking: Top 6 percent
Five-year ranking: Not applicable
Annual expenses: $137 per $10,000 invested

This fund, which launched at the end of 2007, invests globally; comanager Robert Wyckoff says that about two-thirds of assets are invested outside the U.S., mainly in Western Europe. Its managers look for high-yielding, beaten-up companies whose businesses show signs of improving. Unlike some funds that aim to provide dividend income to shareholders, the managers like to reinvest the dividends to bolster long-term total returns; they cite studies showing that following such a practice during market downturns helps investors recoup losses faster. The fund was down 29 percent in 2008 but avoided the 40 percent plus declines logged by many of its global peers. Holdings include cigarette maker Altria, automotive firm Genuine Parts and Dutch manufacturer AkzoNobel.