The Acquisition of Medicinal Plant Knowledge: A Cross-Cultural Survey

Purpose of Study: A 10% random sample of fertility-related plants was taken from Table III of Farnsworth et al.'s article, "Potential Value of Plants as Sources of New Antifertility Agents I" (Farnsworth et al. 1975: 547-554), one of the most extensive compilations of cross-cultural and chemical information on fertility-related plants available in the literature. A single class of medicinal plants, fertility-related medicinals, was chosen because it is possible that the attributes that lead to the identification of fertility-related plants are different than for plants used to treat other conditions. Five objective criteria related to plant morphology, chemistry and ecology were proposed as being significant in contributing to the perceptual salience of potential medicinal plants. The chemical, botanical and ethnographic literature was searched for descriptions of each plant contained in the random sample.

Findings: Of the 15 plant species in the random sample, approximately 70% were found to fit one or more of the criteria related to perceptual salience, supporting the hypothesis that acquisition of medicinal plant knowledge is not the result of purely random processes. It is possible that these attributes are in some way clues to the potential bioactivity of the plant's chemical constituents. Once a link between a certain odor, taste or other characteristic and a specific physiological effect was noted by humans, this may have led to experimentation with other plants with a similar odor, taste, or appearance to produce the same physiological effect.