You’ll gain the required training and experience through several program elements:
- Area specific requirements
- Course requirements as outlined below.
- A first-year summer research paper
- A second-year research paper
- A third-year Major Area Paper
- Research and Teaching Assistantships
- Preliminary exam (based on the second year research paper)
- Dissertation thesis proposal
- Final dissertation defense exam
The Marketing PhD curriculum is very flexible in order to meet students’ needs. Each student, in conjunction with the marketing faculty, develops a program of coursework that best addresses the training required for that student’s interests, given the courses available and the student’s prior academic background.
PhD Curriculum
The marketing area offers several PhD Seminars:
- BA961: Seminar in Quantitative Research in Marketing
- BA962: Seminar in Consumer Behavior
- BA963: Marketing Models Seminar
- BA964: Experimental Design and Analysis Seminar
- BA965: Automaticity
- BA966: Social Cognition
- BA991: Selected Topics (recent special topics seminars have included Consumer Research, Marketing Strategy, and Research Methods)
Each student is expected to take the basic seminar in consumer behavior, marketing strategy, and quantitative marketing. Depending upon their interests, they would also take relevant courses in other areas at the Fuqua School (e.g., decision sciences, management and organizations, operations management) or other departments at Duke or the University of North Carolina (e.g., economics, psychology, statistics, sociology). Each student takes methodology courses appropriate to their area of interest. Because the coursework is tailored to your individual interests, there isn’t a ‘typical’ program in the Marketing PhD program. Here are two potential paths you might take:
Sample Consumer Behavior Program
Year 1
- Seminar in Consumer Behavior
- Research Methods
- Selected Topics in Consumer Research
- Courses in psychology, management and organizations
- Courses in research methodology
Year 2
- Seminar in Quantitative Research in Marketing
- Marketing Strategy
- Special Topics in Consumer Research
- Additional courses in psychology, management and organizations
- Additional courses in research methodology
Sample Marketing Models Program
Year 1
- Seminar in Quantitative Research in Marketing
- Courses in economics (theory and econometrics), statistics, decision sciences, or operations management.
- Courses in research methodology
Year 2
- Seminar in Consumer Behavior
- Marketing Strategy
- Marketing Models Seminar
- Additional courses in economics, statistics, decision sciences, or operations management
- Additional courses in research methodology
Students may also take some courses in their third year. Such courses would typically be ones that are relevant to the student’s particular research interests or courses that were not offered every year that they did not take earlier.
Program Guidelines
Below we discuss guidance for course selection and other matters, progress guidelines, and research assistantships. Because the mechanisms for carrying out these functions differ somewhat depending upon the student’s year in the program, the first year, second year and third year are addressed in separate sections.
First Year
Advice and Guidance
The major mechanism for providing advice and guidance regarding course selection, first-year paper, research and teaching assistantships, and other matters is a first-year academic advisor system. Each student will be assigned two academic advisors before the beginning of the first year. These advisors will contact the student following admission and will continue to interact with the student regarding questions and information prior to the student’s arrival at Duke. These advisors may or may not be the same individuals to whom you are assigned as an RA/TA.
One of the major roles of the advisors during the first year is to assist with course selection, because the program calls for developing a program consistent with, and tailored to, each student’s background and goals. The advisors assist the student in selecting both Fall and Spring courses for the first year and Fall semester courses for the second year. The advisors also provide guidance to the student regarding involvement in research and teaching assistantships and other matters as appropriate throughout the first year. Finally, the advisors provide an important source of information for feedback to the student and for the first-year paper, as described in more detail next.
Throughout the PhD program, students are expected to take full advantage of faculty expertise and the intellectual environment at the Fuqua School. During the first year, students should meet with faculty members one-on-one to learn about different faculty members’ research projects. All students are also expected to attend all the seminars in the marketing workshop/seminar series, and this will be true throughout your time in the PhD program. These seminars are a central feature of intellectual life here. If you have a class that conflicts with seminar, please let your advisors know. Seminar speakers’ schedules typically include a meeting with PhD students; students are expected to take advantage of these opportunities to interact with visiting scholars.
Progress Guidelines
An important part of any doctoral program is a mechanism for assuring that students receive timely and accurate feedback on their progress in the program. Although course grades and informal conversations with faculty members provide some of this information, more formal procedures ensure that each student has the benefit of as much feedback as possible about his or her performance. The procedures used by the marketing area in the first year are outlined below.
The marketing area faculty will gather information about each student’s first year performance Sources of information will include the student’s advisors, instructors, and faculty for whom he/she has been research or teaching assistant. In addition, the student will provide an annual report discussing first year accomplishments, shortcomings, areas of interest, and how the student would like to be positioned. The student will also submit a one to two-page proposal for the first-year paper. The annual report and the first-year paper proposal should be submitted to the marketing area’s PhD coordinator by May 15. Under the graduate school requirements, a separate report also needs to be submitted to the director of Fuqua PhD program by April 15. Students are expected to maintain a cumulative grade point average of “B” (3.00) or better by the end of the first year and throughout the rest of the program. Any student who receives an “F” or fails to exceed or meet a cumulative “B” average by the end of the first year will be subject to dismissal. In assessing performance, incompletes in coursework will not be viewed positively.
An important component of the first year is the first-year paper. This paper is due to the marketing area PhD coordinator on or before the first day of the Fall semester of the second year. Failure to hand in the paper by this date may result in a recommendation for dismissal of the student. The student’s first-year advisors must approve the paper before it can be submitted. The paper should represent the student’s best work at this stage of the doctoral program. The paper may be a reworked paper handed in for a seminar or a new paper done over the summer. It may be empirical, theoretical, or a review. The important point is that it represents work that the student feels best demonstrates his or her capabilities at that point in time. Collaboration with the faculty is allowed with two stipulations: 1) the student should have played a major role in the generation and development of the core idea and 2) the student should do the writing of the first-year paper. The student should provide a statement describing faculty help on the project and the faculty involved should provide statements about their role and the student’s role.
During the Fall semester of the second year, the marketing area faculty will examine the first-year paper, the student’s annual report, grades, and feedback from faculty who have had the student in class and/or have had the student as a research or teaching assistant. The marketing area faculty will provide feedback to the student. If progress is not satisfactory, performance may be assessed again at a time determined by the area faculty. Poor performance may ultimately result in dismissal from the program.
Research and Teaching Assistantships
A critical part of the doctoral program is forming relationships with faculty members and learning about research and teaching processes. To encourage the early formation of such relationships, the marketing doctoral program requires that each student engage in an average of at least ten hours per week of research and teaching assistantship activities throughout the first year. Payment for these ten hours is guaranteed and part of the student’s stipend in the first year. In general, the student will be assigned to specific faculty who are responsible for providing work associated with these hours. The student’s advisors will also provide advice and guidance to help the student become engaged in activities that match their needs and interests with those of the faculty.
Second Year
Advice and Guidelines
At the beginning of the second year, each student will find one or two marketing faculty willing to serve as their academic advisor(s) and inform the marketing area PhD coordinator about this relationship. As in the first year, academic advisors will guide the student on all academic issues. In addition, by October 1 of the second year, each student will form a second-year paper committee made up of four faculty members willing to serve on the committee, with one faculty member designated as its chair. The student must notify the marketing area PhD coordinator in writing regarding the membership of this committee. As the second-year paper is used to meet the formal preliminary examination requirement of the Graduate School, this committee will also serve as the preliminary exam committee.
All students are also expected to attend all the seminars in the marketing workshop/seminar series, and this will be true throughout your time in the PhD program. These seminars are a central feature of intellectual life here. If you have a class that conflicts with seminar, please let your advisors know. Seminar speakers’ schedules typically include a meeting with PhD students; students are expected to take advantage of these opportunities to interact with visiting scholars.
Progress Guidelines
As in the first year, the student will submit an annual report by May 15 along with a one or two-page proposal for the second-year paper. Under the graduate school requirements, a separate report also needs to be submitted to the director of Fuqua PhD program by April 15.
During the second year, students should begin planning and implementing their second-year research paper, which must be completed and presented orally to the faculty. This paper is due to the marketing area PhD coordinator as well as the second-year paper committee on or before the first day of the Fall semester of the third year. The research paper should be a written piece of original research, such as an empirical paper (e.g., based on experiments, surveys, secondary data, or scanner data) or an analytical or other quantitative model. The research may be done jointly with faculty; in fact, joint work with faculty is strongly encouraged. However, the student must have made clear and significant contributions to all phases of the project. The aim is to have a paper which is potentially submittable to a proceedings or journal.
During the Fall semester of the third year, the marketing area faculty will examine the second-year paper, the student’s annual report, grades, and feedback from faculty who have had the student in class and/or have had the student as a research or teaching assistant. Depending upon the level of performance, remedial action or dismissal may be recommended. It is possible that at this stage the student may be advised to seek a terminal master’s degree. If progress is satisfactory, the student orally presents the second-year paper to the preliminary exam committee and the area faculty.
Teaching and Research Assistantships
Throughout the second year, the student should continue to be involved in research and teaching assistantships at a recommended level of at least 10 hours per week, on average. Six of these hours are associated with the student’s stipend. The remaining hours need to come from the individual faculty’s research budget. Consequently, it is incumbent on the student to provide enough value to justify the support of the individual faculty member.
Third Year and Thereafter
At the beginning of the third year, each student finds one or two marketing faculty willing to serve as academic advisor(s) and inform the marketing area PhD coordinator about it. As in the first two years, academic advisors will guide the student on all academic issues. The advisors will approve the topic and scope of a comprehensive review paper (major area paper, or MAP). The comprehensive review paper will be similar to a paper in Psychological Bulletin or Journal of Economics Literature. The purpose of the paper is to explore an area that the student thinks may be the focus of her/his dissertation. In particular, the paper should review the area of interest, point out gaps in current research, and present ideas for research that would fill those gaps. The paper will be due by the first day of classes in fall semester of the fourth year. However, earlier completion of the paper is strongly encouraged.
After the MAP has been successfully completed, the student forms a dissertation committee and begins formulating a dissertation proposal. The student should notify the marketing area PhD coordinator in writing when they form their dissertation committee. The committee must have at least four members, at least one of whom must be from a non-marketing department (e.g., psychology, economics, another area at Fuqua or another business school; someone from marketing at another business school would not meet this requirement). At least three of the members must be from Fuqua. The student will choose a chair or two co-chairs for the dissertation from this committee. The formal steps include selecting the dissertation committee, which could be the committee chosen for the preliminary exam or updated to reflect the research focus of the dissertation, informing the graduate school about that committee, writing a dissertation proposal, defending that proposal, carrying out the dissertation research, filing an intent to graduate form online, defending the dissertation, and filing the completed dissertation.
The student should continue to be involved in research and teaching assistantships at a recommended level of at least 10 hours per week, on average. Only six of these hours are part of the student’s stipend; the others are paid via time cards submitted by the student to the faculty with whom they are working. All students are also expected to attend all the seminars in the marketing workshop/seminar series, and this will be true throughout your time in the PhD program. These seminars are a central feature of intellectual life here. If you have a class that conflicts with seminar, please let your advisors know.