Overall approach
The study used both qualitative and quantitative methods of data collection and analysis. It was conducted in two stages; a preliminary study and a main study. Ethical approval for the study was granted by the University of Bradford Ethics Committee.
It was intended that a questionnaire would be used to collect data from three different ethnic groups living in West Yorkshire regarding their taste perceptions of five selected herbal drugs, which would to be known to and used by all three groups.
In order to choose the most appropriate herbal drugs and ethnic groups for this study, and also to pilot the questionnaire, a preliminary study was conducted.
Preliminary study
The preliminary data collection involved a survey across five different ethnic groups of people living in the Leeds and Bradford area. Between eight and twelve informants were selected from each of the following ethnic groups: English, Caribbean, Chinese, Gujarati, and Kashmiri. The informants were asked to free-list ten herbal drugs they commonly used and to describe their tastes. These selections were then categorised and cross referenced; the aim was to identify 5 herbs commonly used by at least three ethnic groups.
During this stage a structured questionnaire was designed and piloted for use in the main study. The aim of the questionnaire was to collect demographic variables in order to enhance comparative analysis.
The results showed major differences in the use of herbal drugs between the Chinese and Caribbean groups and the other groups. Since the aim of the project was to assess cross-cultural differences in taste perceptions and the medicinal use of commonly used herbal drugs, whose use had to be shared across all the ethnic communities, only the three "closest" groups were considered for the main study: Kashmiris (K), Gujaratis (G), and English (E).
From 46 freelisted herbal drugs, only those five, which were more commonly cited across all three groups were considered. They included: cinnamon (the dried bark of Cinnamomum verum, Lauraceae), mint (the leaves of Mentha spp., Lamiaceae), garlic (the bulbs of Allium sativum, Alliaceae), ginger (the rhizome of Zingiber officinale, Zingiberaceae), and cloves (the dried flower buds of Syzygium aromaticum, Myrtaceae).
A similar type of analysis was carried out for the terms used to describe the taste perceptions associated with the named herbal drugs. From all cited terms (40),, the expressions selected included those which were more ubiquitously used to define the taste of the five selected botanicals; these were "bitter", "sweet", "salty", "sour", "spicy", and "bland". The term "hot" was not considered, because in many cases it was used as a synonym for "spicy".
The three selected communities
The Kashmiri population in Northern England migrated to the UK from the 1950s onwards, from the highly disputed region of Kashmir. Kashmiri is a Dardic language belonging to the Indo-Iranian subgroup of the Indo-European languages. It is estimated that there are approximately five million Kashmiri speakers worldwide [15]. The Kashmiri ethnic group is the largest minority ethnic group living in the Bradford area.
The Gujarati people in Northern England were for the most part born in India or Eastern Africa (to families, who had previously migrated from Western India), and came to Britain in the late 1960s and 1970s. Gujarati is an Indo-Iranian language, which is part of the greater Indo-European language family. It is estimated there are 46 million speakers of Gujarati worldwide [15].
Finally, the English autochthonous population in Western Yorkshire belong to the North English group, speaking varieties of non-rhotic Northern English (Yorkshire dialects).
Main study
A sample of 274 members from the English, Gujarati and Kashmiri communities were randomly selected in Bradford, Leeds and Dewsbury, and interviewed in public locations, i.e. shopping centres, mosques or local community centres over a period of three weeks in March 2006, using a questionnaire that was piloted during the preliminary study. Interviewees were specifically asked to define the taste of each of the five herbal drugs selected for this survey, and to name their perceived medicinal properties or uses. The age, gender and ethnic background of each participant was recorded.
The characteristics of the chosen sample are reported in Figure 1, which graphically illustrates a reasonable balance in the number of people recruited to the study across the three different groups; 36% English (n = 99), 34% Kashmiri participants (n = 94) and 30% Gujarati participants (n = 81). Overall 118 participants were male (43%) and 156 participants female (57%). Women were a majority representation within two ethnic groups (English and Kashmiri) whereas males were a majority in the Gujarati ethnic group. Participant age was recorded across 6 different categories.
At the close of each interview participants were invited to mention anything else they had in mind regarding their taste perceptions or their knowledge of herbal drug use that could bring to light new pieces of information.
Data analysis
Data was analysed using descriptive statistics and cross tables in the 'Statistics Package for Social Sciences' (SPSS). Graphs were produced in Microsoft Excel (MS Excel).