Dr. Catherine Sun
- About
- Education
- Awards & Honors
- Selected Research
Biography
Dr. Catherine Sun is an Assistant Professor in the Fashion Design and Merchandising program in the Department of Family and Consumer Sciences. She earned her Ph.D. in Human Environmental Sciences with an emphasis in Textile and Apparel Management from the University of Missouri. She also holds a Master of Science in Fashion and Luxury Management from SKEMA Business School in France and a Master of Economics in Finance from the University of International Business and Economics in China. Previously, Dr. Sun served as an Assistant Teaching Professor at the Beijing Institute of Fashion Technology and has six years of professional experience in the fashion retail industry as a retail trainer, fashion buyer, and merchandiser.
Current Courses
FCS 379.001 Fashion Retailing
FCS 479.001 Fashion Retailing
FCS 225.001 Textiles
FCS 225.002 Textiles
FCS 225.003 Textiles
Teaching Interests & Areas
Dr. Catherine Sun believes in promoting students’ human capital and career readiness by equipping them with the competencies needed to address real-world challenges and inspiring them to become positive change agents. Her teaching strategy emphasizes inclusivity to foster student autonomy and independence, integrates industry-oriented technology into course content and pedagogical practice, and promotes collaborative problem-solving skills to help students meet both industry and professional needs.
Research Interests & Areas
Dr. Catherine Sun’s primary research focuses on technology-integrated fashion supply chain management. Her overall research goal is to promote human capital and workforce development through human–technology interaction in the fashion supply chain. The questions she aims to address include: How can we prepare people (i.e., students, the workforce, and consumers) to be proactively ready for future digitally driven change from a positive psychological perspective? What is the impact of retail technology and AI on consumer behavior and employee work performance and well-being, and in what ways does this occur? How do fashion business organizations engage in technology-integrated change management and foster digital readiness at the individual, organizational, and technological levels to enhance transformation maturity and performance? In what ways does human–technology interaction influence human capital development cognitively, emotionally, and intentionally? Her current specific research topics include change management and digital readiness within fashion business organizations, AI-powered workforce development, retail automation technology, digital and AI literacy and competency, and AI-integrated teaching and learning research. She utilizes a mixed-method and multi-method approach in her research.