Medicinal plant knowledge in a context of cultural pluralism: A case study in Northeastern Brazil

Abreu, Diego Batista de Oliveira; Santoro, Flávia Rosa; Albuquerque, Ulysses Paulino; Ladio, Ana Haydeé; Medeiros, Patrícia Muniz de

doi:10.1016/j.jep.2015.09.019

Cited by 33 publications

(36 citation statements)

References 27 publications

(29 reference statements)

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“…Before the interviews, we collected basic socioeconomic information (name, age, gender, educational level, and marital status) to identify the informants. We used knowledge on ethnospecies of medicinal plants as a model because we believe that individual knowledge is retrieved during free listing and that the same informant will not provide different names for the same plant species [50]. This approach generates several lists of items that may or may not be valid for a given culture [2]; however, we realize that the information obtained during an interview results from specific memory processes.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Information Retrieval during Free Listing Is Biased by Memory: Evidence from Medicinal Plants

et al. 2016

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Free listing is a methodological tool that is widely used in various scientific disciplines. A typical assumption of this approach is that individual lists reflect a subset of total knowledge and that the first items listed are the most culturally important. However, little is known about how cognitive processes influence free lists. In this study, we assess how recent memory of use, autonoetic and anoetic memory, and long-term associative memory can affect the composition and order of items in free lists and evaluate whether free lists indicate the most important items. Based on a model of local knowledge about medicinal plants and their therapeutic targets, which was collected via individual semi-structured interviews, we classify each item recorded in free lists according to the last time that the item was used by the informant (recently or long ago), the type of relevant memory (autonoetic or anoetic memory) and the existing associations between therapeutic targets (similar or random). We find that individuals have a tendency to recall information about medicinal plants used during the preceding year and that the recalled plants were also the most important plants during this period. However, we find no trend in the recall of plants from long-term associative memory, although this phenomenon is well established in studies on cognitive psychology. We suggest that such evidence should be considered in studies that use lists of medicinal plants because this temporal cognitive limit on the retrieval of knowledge affects data interpretation.

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Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Information Retrieval during Free Listing Is Biased by Memory: Evidence from Medicinal Plants

et al. 2016

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“…Not only people migrate; a whole set of local or traditional knowledge migrates with them (Pieroni & Vandebroek 2007;Ceuterick et al 2008;2011;Andel & Westers 2010;Abreu et al 2015), and propagules, seeds and plants can also be transported and adapted (see Medeiros et al 2012). The study of the migration of human populations is fundamentally important for understanding the dynamics of biocultural knowledge and transformations in natural and urban landscapes through times past and in the current globalized world (Pieroni & Vandebroek 2007;Waldstein 2008;Salpeteur et al 2016).…”

Section: How Have Current and Past Migrations Been Shaping Pbks?mentioning

confidence: 99%

Ten important questions/issues for ethnobotanical research

et al. 2019

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For at least 30 years researchers have called for a deeper refl ection on the paths we desire for ethnobotanical research. Although the discipline of ethnobotany is growing, as measured by the number of publications in the area, there is still work to be done regarding the homogeneity of theoretical and methodological approaches and the implications of ethnobotanical research fi ndings for society as a whole. In this article we present 10 questions/issues that we believe can guide the research and actions of ethnobotanists for the coming years.

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“…The first type focuses on traditional groups with comparatively long residence in the region ( inter alia : Heinrich et al [8], Hilgert and Gil [21–22], Leonti et al [23], Boer et al [12]). The second type concentrates on the comparison of medicinal plant use by ethnic groups with different times of residence in a given region, such as the case of the native Italians and the historical Albanian community in southern Italy studied by Pieroni and Quave [24], and groups with different trajectories of migration process [25]. …”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Medicinal Plant Diversity and Inter-Cultural Interactions between Indigenous Guarani, Criollos and Polish Migrants in the Subtropics of Argentina

et al. 2017

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Numerous studies highlight the importance of phytotherapy for indigenous and non-indigenous people in different parts of the world. In this work we analyze the richness (number of species), diversity (plant identity and the number of illnesses for which it is used) and similarity of plant species and illnesses treated with them, in order to contribute new data and insight into the importance of plant medicines to the local medical systems of people living in Misiones province, in the subtropics of Argentina. Three sympatric groups were compared: Guarani Indians, Criollos (mestizos) and Polish migrants. Quantitative scrutiny was focused on both primary and secondary sources. The similarity and diversity of medicinal plants and uses between groups was calculated by applying the Sørensen quantitative coefficient and the Shannon-Wiener index, respectively. In order to identify the characteristic plant species used by each group, the Cultural Importance and Prevalence Value (CIPV) was calculated based on the species Indicator Value (IndVal), which combines a species relative abundance with its relative frequency of occurrence in the various groups, and modified according to the type of the analyzed data. The important finding is a great variation in the number of species used by the study groups. Altogether, 509 botanical species were registered: Guarani (397), Criollos (243) and Polish migrants (137). For all groups, the use of native medicinal plants prevailed. The Guarani appear to be the local experts in use of medicinal plants. There is the significant difference in the number of treated illnesses by each taxon among three groups. Criollos and Polish migrants exhibit the greatest similarity in illnesses treated with medicinal plants. These groups share a corpus of knowledge related to illness nosology, and have a symptomatic approach to illness treatment. The Guarani have an etiological approach to illness diagnosis and healing, which may be viewed as a barrier to the exchange of knowledge about home medicine with other ethnic groups of Misiones.

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Medicinal plant knowledge in a context of cultural pluralism: A case study in Northeastern Brazil

Cited by 33 publications

References 27 publications

Information Retrieval during Free Listing Is Biased by Memory: Evidence from Medicinal Plants

Information Retrieval during Free Listing Is Biased by Memory: Evidence from Medicinal Plants

Ten important questions/issues for ethnobotanical research

Medicinal Plant Diversity and Inter-Cultural Interactions between Indigenous Guarani, Criollos and Polish Migrants in the Subtropics of Argentina

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