Theoretical underpinnings of research in strategic marketing: a commentary

It is conceivable that some readers might view my remarks regarding the marginalization of philosophy of science and theory focused course content from doctoral programs in marketing as being oblivious to the difficult trade-off decisions that institutions must make regarding the curriculum content of marketing doctoral programs. To the contrary, I am sympathetic and understanding of the challenges faced by Directors of Doctoral Programs in Marketing and faculty members intimately involved in doctoral programs in capacities such as teaching doctoral seminars, and chairing and serving on doctoral dissertation committees. Clearly, the current expectations of the marketplace (institutions recruiting PhDs in marketing for faculty positions) regarding the research skills repertoire that PhDs in marketing are expected to possess and demonstrate is substantially higher than was the case during earlier decades. Likewise, at journals, the baseline threshold of conceptual and methodological rigor that manuscripts must meet has risen over the years. With the creation of new knowledge and a better understanding of the limitations of the research methods currently in vogue, the state-of-the-art of methodological rigor is destined to be even higher in the future than it currently is. Understandably, in order to make room for more doctoral coursework designed to equip the students with the state-of-the-art training in research methods, modeling, metrics, and data analysis, some of the courses that were integral to doctoral programs in marketing during an earlier era needed to be eliminated and others combined. Making room for new knowledge in the course content of a doctoral program inevitably entails deleting and/or combining some of the current course content. Assigning methodological rigor the front seat and relegating conceptual rigor to the back seat could indeed be a carefully thought through trade-off decision. My cautionary note in this regard is that this could have an adverse impact from the standpoint of organic and mid-range theories development in marketing.

I wish to acknowledge that in some of my published works, I draw on multiple theories in support of the proposed conceptual model and research propositions (e.g., Varadarajan et al. 2001; Kalaignanam and Varadarajan 2012). However, the implications of the assumptions underlying multiple theories that a model is based on is an issue that I have been pondering about only relatively recently.

For instance, Tsang (2006) distinguishes between assumptions-based theory testing and assumptions-omitted theory testing, and notes that most empirical research in transaction cost economics is assumptions-omitted testing. He further notes that in order to establish a solid foundation for a new theory, there is a need for researchers to pay greater attention to assumptions-based theory testing.