Table 2

Example of EMCSI compute process for the responses of three interviewees
Var.
 Question
 I 1
 Cat.
 Val.
 I 2
 Cat.
 Val.
 I 3
 Val.
 Compute
QI
 Sp. mentioned in his/her free list
 Yes
1
 Yes
1
 No
 0
 2/3 = 0.67*
PAI
 Informant rank the abundance of spi
 B
 B
 2.5
 C
 C
 5
0
 3.75
FUI
 How often do you eat spi?
 Every week
 4 or more a year
 10
 Monthly from Jul. to Sep.
 2–3 times a year
 7.5
0
 8.75
TSAI
 How much do you like spi?
 D
 D
 10
 C
 C
 6.67
0
 8.335
MFFI
 How do you cook spi?
 Fried in butter, raw
 Cooked alone plus raw (9 + 1)
 10
 "Amarillito con hongos"
 Not principal element
 5
0
 7.5
KTI
 How many generations know...
 Since grandma
 Three or more generations
 10
 Learned from husband
 Town, not blood parent
 5
0
 7.5
HI
 How safe is to eat spi...
 Eat it with confidence
6.67
 Because it is good to health
10
0
 8.335
EI
 Have you sold/bought spi...
 No
0
 Buy every month
 Regularly
 6.67
0
 3.335
EMCSI








46.404

In Var.: Variable. QI: Mention Index. PAI: Perceived Abundance Index. FUI: Frequency of Use Index. TSAI: Taste Score

Appreciation Index. MFFI: Multifunctional Food Index. KTI: Knowledge Transmission index. HI: Health Index. EI: Economic Index.

EMCSI: Edible Mushroom Cultural Significance Index. I 1, I 2, I 3: Answers of informants 1, 2 and 3. Cat.: Categorization. Val. Value. In the entire table, the categorizations and associated values are those indicated in Table 1. In Compute: * the formula for QI = (Number of mentions/Number of informants) 10. However, note than the division by 10 is to fit QI values to the same scale of other variables, because in this example just 3 informants were considered, the division was not done. The final value of each variable (except QI) is the average of informants' responses considering just those that knew the species; in this case 2.

Garibay-Orijel et al. Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine 2007 3:4   doi:10.1186/1746-4269-3-4