Visit the admissions calendar for admissions information and application deadlines.
Program Overview
The organizational behavior and human resources doctoral concentration, offered by the management department at the Moore School, is designed to produce scholars who wish to conduct high-level theoretical and empirical research and teach at major research institutions. The program stresses close contact between a small group of doctoral students and a distinguished faculty. The program of study consists of small seminar classes, individual faculty attention and research mentoring relationships wherein doctoral students work closely with faculty members engaged in leading-edge research.
The program is full-time and takes approximately five years to complete. Ph.D. students receive a nationally competitive stipend and teaching opportunities, a 100 percent tuition supplement and a 100 percent medical insurance subsidy.
Program Prerequisites
A student should possess an undergraduate or graduate degree and have completed undergraduate or graduate course work in each of the following areas with a minimum grade of “B.” These prerequisites can be satisfied during a student's tenure in the doctoral program by completing the courses below.
- Financial Accounting or Managerial Accounting (ACCT 225 or 226)
- Two of the following: Finance (FINA 363 or 760), Marketing (MKTG 350 or 701) or Management (MGMT 371 or 770)
- Introductory Economics (ECON 224)
- Statistics (MGSC 291 or 692)
Course Requirements
The student, in consultation with a Ph.D. advisory committee, develops a program of study giving consideration to his or her academic background and professional objectives. The program of study must meet the general requirements of the Moore School as outlined below.
A. Major Area: Each student must complete at least 15 semester hours of course work in organizational behavior/human resource management and related disciplines (e.g., psychology, sociology) approved by the Ph.D. advisory committee.
The following is a partial list of courses that students may take to fulfill this requirement:
- BADM 880 Readings and Research — Independent Study
- MGMT 821 Doctoral Seminar in the Behavioral Sciences I — Study of major theoretical and methodological issues in organizational behavior with emphasis on developing conceptual models and implementing research designs
- MGMT 822 Doctoral Seminar in the Behavioral Sciences II — Exploration of current specialized topics in organizational behavior with emphasis on synthesizing research, developing conceptual models and implementing research designs
- MGMT 823 Current Issues in Organizational Behavior — (Prerequisite: MGMT 821 or 822) An advanced seminar focusing on reading, synthesis and critical evaluation of current research in organizational behavior
- MGMT 824 Doctoral Seminar in Human Resource Management — Theories and research in human resource management
- MGMT 871 Organization Theory — An evaluation of theories of organization, with particular emphasis on business applications. Approaches to a conceptual framework include decision theory, sociological and behavioral theories. Various models are evaluated in an attempt to build a framework for analysis of organizations.
- PSYC 770 Survey of Social Psychology — Issues, research and theories in social psychology
- PSYC 706 Seminar in Judgment and Decision-Making — Research and theories of processes in judgment, choice and decision-making
B. Cognate Area: Students must take nine semester hours of cognate course work. The cognate area may include courses from academic areas within or outside of the Moore School. All courses must be approved by the student's advisory committee and the associate dean for academic affairs. The most popular cognate areas for students in management have been:
- International Business
- Human Resources Management
- Social Psychology
C. Research Tools: The Moore School requires that all doctoral students complete at least 18 hours of research tools course work as specified by the major area of concentration. The specific course work required will include no more than six hours of research tools course work from the major area of concentration and must be approved by the student's Ph.D. advisory committee, program director and associate dean for academic affairs. The following is a partial list of courses that students take to fulfill this requirement:
- EDRM 718 Research and the Statistical Packages — (one to three credits) Advanced use of available statistical packages in educational research. Content varies; topics and credit announced in advance.
- MGMT 872 Seminar in Management Research Methodology — (three credits) (Prerequisite: MGSC 792) Research methods and techniques for translation of management theory and practical problems into testable propositions.
- MGSC 792 Advanced Statistics for Business and Economics — (three credits) The development and application of advanced statistical methods to problems in business and economics. Topics include application of estimation and hypothesis testing in both univariate and multivariate cases.
- MGSC 892 Experimental Research Methods — (three credits) The structure and analysis of experimental and research designs with applications to business and economic problems.
- MKTG 850 Research Methods and Philosophies in Marketing — (three credits) Doctoral seminar covering research methods and philosophies that underpin knowledge generation in marketing.
- MKTG 854 Latent Variable Estimation Techniques — (three credits) Doctoral seminar examining covariance structure methods for developing measures of unobservable constructs and testing structural models.
- PSYC 821 Theory of Psychological Measurement — (three credits) (Prerequisite: PSYC 225 or the equivalent) A survey of psychological scaling and factor theory, together with special techniques for achieving reliability and validity, including item analysis.
- SOCY 751 Topics in the Analysis of Social Networks — (three credits) Selected topics in the theory, measurement and analysis of social networks.
D. Dissertation Preparation (12 hours): A minimum of 12 hours of dissertation preparation is required.
E. Additional Graduate Course Work: The Graduate School requires that a student have a minimum of 60 hours of graduate course work beyond an undergraduate degree before he or she can be awarded a Ph.D. Therefore, students without a master’s degree may be required to take six additional semester hours of graduate course work beyond that specified above.
Additional Requirements
A. Research and Teaching: Prior to receiving the Ph.D. degree, each student must teach and participate in research under the direction of a faculty member of the Moore School
B. Language Requirement: The candidate must demonstrate competency in a computer programming language or statistics as demonstrated by appropriate course work or examination by the student's Ph.D. advisory committee.
C. Dissertation: Each candidate must present a dissertation that gives evidence of original and significant research. The dissertation must be completed no later than five years after successful completion of the comprehensive examination. The candidate must defend the dissertation before a committee consisting of no fewer than four members, as prescribed by the Graduate School.