ABSTRACT

This chapter describes how the grounded theory of the acceptability of urban road pricing was derived through the method of constant comparisons. The process of developing a complete grounded theory can be broken down into three stages: open, axial and selective coding. Open coding is the process of breaking down, examining, comparing, conceptualising and categorising data and through this process one's own and others' assumptions about phenomena are questioned or explored, leading to new discoveries. Once ideas for the categories emerged they needed to be checked against data. The technique that was used is called discourse analysis. This involves looking for indication of the grounded theory in actual excerpts of taped data. The preliminary stage of the analysis is needed to get to a more coherent set of theoretical concepts and to demonstrate why certain options were ruled out in favour of the final selection.