Ho Chi Cheng

About:

I’m a Ph.D. student in International Merchandising at the University of Georgia and a recipient of the Presidential Graduate Fellowship and the Virginia Wilbanks Kilgore Scholarship. 

I completed both my B.A. and M.A. in Economics at Virginia Tech, graduating Summa Cum Laude. My work sits at the intersection of consumer behavior, econometrics, and operations research. I study how people decide what something is worth, focusing on how social media environments, brand narratives, and psychological cues shape value perception and decision-making.

Before starting my Ph.D., I worked as a research assistant in the Grado Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, where I applied Markov Decision Processes (MDPs) to healthcare decision problems, including sequential decision-making for dementia care.

Methodologically, I use Python and R for modeling and simulation, along with Stata, SPSS, SQL, and Excel for empirical analysis. I have also served as a teaching assistant for undergraduate economics courses and co-founded an Economics Club.

Research Topics:

• The Economics of Social Media

• The Economics of the Fashion Industry

• The Impact of Brands on Consumer Behavior

• The Impact of Online Social Networks on Economic Behavior

• Gender and Leadership in Social Media Marketing (TikTok & Fashion Brands)

• Social Media Influencers and the Price–Quality Belief in Luxury Consumption