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The Journal of the Royal Institute of Thailand Volume IV - 2012 152  Research paradigm The researcher’s decision to adopt constructive, interpretive, and qualitative paradigm derived from two reasons. First, the issues relating to the research questions had not been clearly identi fi ed and/or addressed by Thai researchers. Any interests in Thai food leaned towards restaurant food with the purpose of supporting the Thai government’s “Thai Kitchen to the World” plan, rather than towards processed Thai food products. Since each research endeavour differs greatly according to the context and is not totally interchangeable with others, qualitative exploratory research is best suited in explaining a detailed view of the socially constructed reality that has not been identi fi ed (Creswell, 2007). Second, there are insigni fi cant numbers of Thai ethnic and marketing activities to generate a satisfactory level of Thai cultural visibility in American society. However, the growing popularity of Thai food induces great interest in understanding American values, attitudes, and behaviours, especially when interacting with Thai culture and cultural symbolism. Given that Thai food is a fairly new ethnic product, its values are needed to be con fi rmed. Moreover, consumer acculturation is a multidimensional process that potentially occurs across generations, a researcher with suf fi cient time and resources to spend on extensive fi eld research can explore detailed views of American consumers and other related parties by participating in their natural setting (Creswell, 2007). The researcher approached theoretical perspectives using grounded theory methodology (Glaser, Strauss, 1967). The theory consists of systematic inductive guidelines for data collection (theoretical sampling), analysis (coding, categorising, and constant comparisons), and theoretical frameworks for data interpretation (conceptualisation) (Charmaz, 2005: 507). According to Strauss, Corbin (1990), it is suitable for the discovery of phenomena that are less known and dif fi cult to uncover with quantitative methods. The grounded theory also allows researchers to interview people who are engaging in the phenomena in question, make multiple visits to the fi eld, develop categories of information, and generate a theory grounded in data from the respondents’ worldviews (Creswell, 2007). Given the emergent principles of pure grounded theory, this research was more targeted towards speci fi c elements of food Thai Food: A Gateway to Cultural Understanding