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Current Chaifetz School Ph.D. Students

2024-25 Chaifetz School of Business PhD Students pose in front of a fountain while wearing business attire.

Saint Louis University’s Ph.D. in International Business and Marketing brings together students from across the country and around the world to learn, research and teach alongside the Chaifetz School’s renowned faculty.


Alex Brinkmeier, Ph.D. candidate at the Chaifetz School of Business

Alex Brinkmeier

Alex Brinkmeier joined the Ph.D. program at the Chaifetz School of Business in 2021. She has varied work experience within the hotel and hospitality industry. Her research interests include services marketing and family firms, with an emphasis on understanding how family firms differ in their operations. In 2023, she was elected to a leadership position for the United States Association of Small Business and Entrepreneurship (USASBE) Family Business Special Interest Group and accepted to the USASBE Doctoral Consortium for Teaching and Learning in Entrepreneurship.

Before joining SLU, Alex received an MBA from Coastal Carolina University, a Bachelor of Science in Marketing, and a Bachelor of Science in Hospitality and Tourism Administration from Southern Illinois University Carbondale.


Bin ChangBin Chang headshot

Bin is a first-year doctoral student in the Department of International Business and Marketing at Saint Louis University. Before joining SLU, Bin received a Master of International Business from the University of Glasgow and a Bachelor of Accounting from Harbin University of Science and Technology. Her main research interests focus on E-business. She is also interested in online customer purchase behavior and advertising analysis. She is a research assistant for the Chaifetz School of Business and the Behavioral Lab.


Yeon Jae Choi, Ph.D. candidate at the Chaifetz School of BusinessYeon Jae Choi

Yeon Jae Choi became a doctoral student in the Department of International Business and Marketing in the fall of 2021. Her research interests lie in the psychological aspects of the consumer decision-making process, online communities, user-generated content (UGC), netnography, cognitive biases, and consumer neuroscience. She is also interested in electric vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL). Before joining SLU, Yeon Jae received an M.S. in marketing from the University of Illinois Chicago. She received a B.A. in English and BBA in business administration from Korea Aerospace University.


Xixi Li, Ph.D. candidate at the Chaifetz School of BusinessXixi Li

Xixi Li is a Ph.D. student at Saint Louis University in the Department of International Business and Marketing. She joined the program in the fall of 2020. Her main research interests center around corporate social responsibility and luxury consumption. She is also interested in topics related to CSR online communication of multinational corporations. Before joining SLU, Xixi received an MBA from Emporia State University, a Master of Education degree from South China Normal University, and a Bachelor of Business Administration degree from Guilin University of Electrical Technology. 


Pooja RamankuttyPooja Ramankutty headshot

Pooja joined the Ph.D. program at the Chaifetz School of Business in 2022. She obtained her Bachelor of Science in Psychological and Brain Sciences from the University of California, Santa Barbara and an MBA specializing in human resources and organizational behavior from California State University, East Bay. Her current research interests include sociocultural influences behind consumer behavior.


Fan Wang, Ph.D. candidate at the Chaifetz School of BusinessFan Wang

Fan Wang joined the doctoral program in the Department of International Business and Marketing at Saint Louis University in 2021. Before joining SLU, she received a Bachelor of Art in Public Administration from the University of International Business and Economics in Beijing and a Bachelor of Art in International Accounting from Shandong University of Finance and Economics.

Fan has more than 15 years of managerial experience working with American, German, Swedish and Swiss companies and hopes that her Ph.D. will help her achieve her goal of becoming a marketing and international business scholar. Her research interests are consumer behavior and digital marketing integrated with international business.