BlogToBoom: Marketing Ph.D. Program at Berkeley

The marketing Ph.D. program at the Haas School offers a broad range of avenues for study and exploration. In keeping with the traditional interest in operational marketing problems, students may undertake advanced studies in the mathematical modeling of buyer-seller interactions, consumer choice processes, the allocation of marketing resources into components of the marketing mix, and product development. Students may also specialize in the study of the behavioral dimensions of buyer behavior, examining attitude structures, motivations, group influences, and communication processes at the final or industrial levels.

Alternatively, the student can focus upon the development of strategic direction for the profit or nonprofit organization. Study here can include the process of market evolution, competitive behavior, and the maintenance of organizational differential advantages through product and market development, mergers, and research and development. Students may also choose to develop specialties in marketing system efficiency and fairness; the regulation of the marketing system; the evolution, growth, and modeling of distribution systems; and comparative marketing systems.

In order to cope with these expanding horizons, each marketing program is designed to provide a broad exposure to the advanced literature in each field. Students then select an area for intensive study and develop a program that trains them to comprehend and perform cutting-edge research in that field. The program includes a series of marketing Ph.D. seminars and the development of expertise in a particular social science discipline and technical skill appropriate to the analysis of the problems to be studied. The field offers four Doctoral Seminars in Marketing (BA269A-D): Consumer Behavior, Choice Models, Marketing Strategy, and Special Topics in Marketing. The objective of these courses is to familiarize the students with the existing marketing literature. In this sense, these courses are extensive in nature, covering most aspects in marketing, and presenting a framework to think about the existing literature. Classes are organized with a balance of lectures and discussion.

These tools are applied to marketing problems within the group's seminar program for Ph.D. students and in individual studies with faculty members. These activities are designed to launch students upon their own research programs and the preparation of depth prospectus. The depth prospectus serves to identify critical issues within the student's intended areas of study, provide a partial basis for field examinations, and guide the selection of dissertation advisors.

Aiding the students as they develop their research skills is a growing range of interactive and mainframe computers with specialized marketing software, a campus Survey Research Center providing aid and service to students and faculty on all aspects of the administration of questionnaires, and the maintenance of a student subject pool that permits sophisticated experimental research. Research units associated with the business school allow students to develop contacts with faculty and a means of seeking employment.

http://groups.haas.berkeley.edu/marketing/program.html

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