Ph.D. Program of Study
The ASU Marketing Department was recently ranked #4 in the entire country in research productivity.
http://chronicle.com/stats/productivity/page.php?year=2007&institution=93&byinst=Go
The PhD program is for those students who want to become full-time professors at research-oriented universities. It is not intended for people who want to work in industry positions. It is a full-time program only, and students take all of their courses on-campus, and thus cannot complete the program online.
All students complete a core curriculum, yet tailor their work to achieve personal goals. For those who already hold a master’s degree, our program is designed to be completed in four years. For those who hold a bachelor’s degree, our program is designed to be completed in five years.
The program begins with four core marketing seminars, developed specifically for doctoral students, which are taken during the first year of study:
- Marketing Research Design (Fall): The objective of this seminar is to acquaint students with conceptual and technical issues in the design of academic research projects.
- Marketing Management (Fall): The primary objective of this seminar is to develop awareness and understanding of the marketing management literature. This involves an analysis of the major decision making challenges confronting marketing managers, explicating the alternative theories, models, and methods that have been presented for dealing with these decisions. This seminar is currently taught by Prof. Hutt.
- Consumer Behavior (Spring): The purpose of this seminar is to investigate academic research on consumer behavior, providing students with knowledge and skills to critically evaluate and conduct research in the area. This seminar is currently taught by Prof. Nowlis.
- Marketing Models (Spring): The purpose of this seminar is to investigate research in marketing models.
In addition to the courses above, students typically also take one more class each semester (for a total of three courses each semester). These courses are usually taken outside of the business school, and focus on issues such as research methodology and theoretical foundations.
Upon completion of the first year of coursework, students are required to turn in a research paper and also present this research to the faculty.
During the second year of study, we also offer the following marketing seminars:
- Services Science (Fall): The purpose of this seminar is to introduce students to the academic literature on services marketing. This seminar is currently taught by Prof. Bitner, who is the Academic Director of the Center for Services Leadership here at ASU.
- New Product Development (Spring): The purpose of this seminar is to introduce students to the academic literature on new product development and diffusion of innovations. This seminar is currently taught by Prof. Sinha.
In addition to the courses above, students typically also take two more classes each semester (for a total of three courses each semester) during their second year of study. These courses are usually taken outside of the business school, and focus on issues such as research methodology and theoretical foundations.
For those students who already hold a master’s degree, the two years of coursework just mentioned is typically enough to advance to the dissertation. For those with only a bachelor’s degree, usually one more year of coursework is needed (which can be tailored to individual research interests).
Upon completion of the course work, a written comprehensive exam is administered that covers the field of marketing. This written exam consists of two parts. The first part is typically a review of research in the student’s area of interest, and the second part is typically the development of an original research idea.
During the last two years in the program, students focus on their dissertation and usually do not take any more courses. The dissertation centers on the development and defense of independent research contributing to the advancement of marketing knowledge.
For Further Information
Please address inquiries:
Dr. Naomi Mandel
Doctoral Studies Coordinator
Department of Marketing
W. P. Carey School of Business
Arizona State University
PO Box 874106
Tempe, AZ 85287-4106
naomi.mandel@asu.edu
Internet: wpcarey.asu.edu/mkt
Applications are submitted through the ASU Graduate College:
