Introduction to ethnobotanical survey methods some content is quoted directly from: Rajindra K. Puri and Christian R. Vogl 2005 A methods manual for ethnobiological research and cultural domain analysis with analysis using ANTHROPAC or from Borgatti ANTHROPAC 4.0 Methods Guide. Natick, MA: Analytic Technologies.

Types of interviews Informal interview: chatting –total lack of structured control –“get people onto a topic and get out of the way” Unstructured –clear plan but minimum control Semi-structured interview –script, interview guide, list of topics, open ended Structured interview –People respond to a nearly identical set of stimuli –Questionnaire, Freelist, triad, pile sort, rating, ranking, etc…. Adapted from Puri and Vogl 2005

Cultural domain analysis READ ME Defining a cultural domain Anthropologists often use domain analysis to help them understand how people in a society define their world. Since all cultures use some system of categories to order experience, the anthropologist tries to determine what categories are important to people, how they are arranged and why, and what values are attached to them. What is a Cultural Domain? A category with a bunch of elements or items that is organized according to rules or criteria that are culturally determined and may be culturally specific. For example, the domains 'edible foods' or 'medicinal plants' or ‘breakfast’ or ‘kin’ can be quite varied from culture to culture and items can be included or excluded for a variety of reasons. Why study Cultural Domains? Domains and what they include are learned as you grow up in a society and are clearly necessary for perceiving, interpreting and communicating your experiences with the world and people. Domains are the starting point for studying people's perceptions of the natural world. Thus they are relevant to anthropologists, ethnobotanists and conservationists! Adapted from Puri and Vogl 2005

Structured Interview Techniques for Domain Analysis Freelisting  Triads, Pilesorts  Paired Comparisons, Rating, Ranking  Weighted ranking  Consensus analysis  Factor analysis, PROFIT  Identify its components/items Discover their arrangement Identify rules for arrangement Explore the associated values Explore variability in a group Explain variability Adapted from Puri and Vogl 2005

Structured Interview Techniques for Domain Analysis Freelisting  Triads, Pilesorts  Paired Comparisons, Rating, Ranking  Weighted ranking  Consensus analysis  Factor analysis  Identify its components/items Discover their arrangement Identify rules for arrangement Explore the associated values Explore variability in a group Explain variability Adapted from Puri and Vogl 2005

Freelisting Practically speaking, to define a cultural or cognitive domain is to make a list of its elements. For example, to define the domain of fruits is to generate a list of things that people in a given culture would consider a fruit. The researcher doesn’t always know what elements of the domain are (unlike the domain of English Names of Months of the Year). An example: “Please write down as many bad words as you can think of. Don't be embarrassed to write down even the really bad ones. Thank you.” Write them down in the order that they occur to you! Do not edit the spelling! (You can do it later with help of the people.) Yields the list of elements and also measures of frequency and also “saliency” of the elements. Adapted from Borgatti. 1996

Pilesort, triads The basic pilesort technique asks informants to "sort these [items] into piles according to how similar they are." single pilesort successive pilesort triads (For all possible combinations, ask “Which of one of these three is different from the others?”

Paired Comparisons, Ranking Paired comparisons All possible pairs, select one of the two based on a single scaled criterion (preference, more dangerous, bigger, more resistant to drought, etc.). Ranking Arrange all of them in order along the scale of (preference, etc.). In what circumstances would you prefer one method over the other?

Cultural consensus analysis Consensus analysis is both a theory and a method. As a theory, it specifies the conditions under which more agreement among individuals on the right answers to a "test" indicates more knowledge on their part. As a method, it provides a way to uncover the culturally correct answers to a set of questions in the face of certain kinds of intra-cultural variability. At the same time, it enables the researcher to assess the extent of knowledge possessed by an informant about a given cultural domain. Adapted from Borgatti. 1996

Cultural consensus analysis Researcher doesn’t necessarily know the “correct answer.” Can study variation among people’s knowledge of the domain. Yields “competence” score for each person, but it really measures shared knowledge, not necessarily competence (experts have specialist knowledge that is not shared). Assumptions: one culture, one domain, independence among responses and respondents.