Food Quality and Preference 83 (2020) 103930

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Food Quality and Preference

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/foodqual

What is gastronomy? An exploratory study of social representation of T

gastronomy and Mexican cuisine among experts and consumers using a
qualitative approach
⁎
Edgar Rojas-Rivasa, , Alicia Rendón-Domíngueza, José Alberto Felipe-Salinasb, Facundo Cuffiac
a
Escuela Profesional de Gastronomía, Universidad de Ixtlahuaca CUI, Ixtlahuaca de Rayón, Mexico
b
Licenciatura en Gastronomía, Universidad de Ixtlahuaca CUI, Ixtlahuaca de Rayón, Mexico
c
Facultad de Ingeniería Química, Universidad Nacional del Litoral, Santiago del Estéreo 2829, S3000AOM, Santa Fe, Argentina

A R T I C LE I N FO A B S T R A C T

Keywords: The aim of this work was to explore, based on language of experts and consumers, how they define the concept of
Gastronomy gastronomy and Mexican cuisine applying the Theory of Social Representation. Gastronomy has become very
Chefs and consumers relevant in the recent years and numerous researches on the matter have been published. Likewise, gastronomy
Social representation has become one of the main drivers for tourists to travel to a certain destination, such as Mexico, whose tra-
Word association
ditional cuisine has been included within the List of Intangible Cultural Heritage of UNESCO. This research was
Open-ended questions
Free listing task
carried out in two phases: the first one through 22 semi-structured interviews with chefs who work in public and
private schools of gastronomy in Mexico, and the second one through a convenience sampling in Central Mexico
with a sample of 329 Mexican consumers. Information was obtained through Open-Ended questions, Word
Association technique (WA) and Free Listing (FL) task. Interviews were recorded, transcribed and analyzed
through content analysis. The words or terms obtained from the WA were grouped into categories by means of
lemmatization process. Through FL, there were obtained the main foods, ingredients or dishes of Mexican cuisine
and Cognitive Salience Index (CSI) was calculated. Results of this research establish that gastronomy is a
complex concept and that the social representation of chefs and consumers are related with traditional and
human aspects, sensory characteristics of foods, apart from techniques, methods and forms of food preparation.
In this sense, the categories, foods, and ingredients that characterize Mexican cuisine are discussed based on the
language of experts and consumers applying the Theory of Social Representation.

1. Introduction
Evolution of the human and its relationship with food have moved
from shortage to overabundance, mainly due to technological and so-
cioeconomic factors. The human is also the only species in the world
that prepares its food based on social norms, fashions, beliefs or cus-
toms (Bolaños, 2009). In addition, the multiple forms of food pre-
paration within a society, together with the traditions or beliefs related
to it, reflect the gastronomy of a specific place or territory (Guerrero
et al., 2010).
The understanding of a culture or society could be achieved through
the study of its diet or the way it prepares and consumes its food.
Etymologically, the term gastronomy (gaster – nomos) refers to the rules
(nomos) of eating and drinking foods which goes in the stomach (gaster)
(Ory, 2013). The classic definition of gastronomy is: ‘the art of
preparing and eating good food’ (RAE, 2018). Another definition widely
accepted is the one proposed by Brillat-Savarin (2004), who states that
gastronomy is not only related to the preparation of food, but also to
how, with whom, where and when the human consumes it. According
to the aforementioned author, it is complex to define gastronomy since
it has always only been related to production, service and consumption
of food. For his part, Richards (2002) defined gastronomy as a reflexive
process of cooking, preparing, presenting and eating food.
Gillespie (2001) established that gastronomy is the recognition of
the factors associated with the consumption of food and beverages
within a locality, region or nation. According to this author (Gillespie,
2001), gastronomy can be divided into four main areas: practical,
theoretical, technical and food. However, the wide range of definitions
does not help clarify the concept of gastronomy. Bahls and Wendhausen
(2019) recognize that gastronomic discipline shows great immaturity at

⁎
Corresponding author at: Escuela Profesional de Gastronomía, Universidad de Ixtlahuaca CUI, Carretera Ixtlahuaca-Jiquipilco KM 1, C.P. 50740, Ixtlahuaca de
Rayón, Mexico.
E-mail address: edgar.rojas@uicui.edu.mx (E. Rojas-Rivas).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foodqual.2020.103930
Received 29 November 2019; Received in revised form 5 March 2020; Accepted 5 March 2020
Available online 09 March 2020
0950-3293/ © 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
E. Rojas-Rivas, et al.
the conceptual level. In this context, studying from the language of
people the way the concept of gastronomy is built can contribute to its
consolidation through a conceptual framework that can be useful to
actors involved in the gastronomic field. This acquires relevance in a
country like Mexico, whose traditional cuisine has been inscribed on
the List of Intangible Heritage of Humanity of UNESCO (2010) and
where a public policy was declared in 2015, aimed at promoting na-
tional gastronomy (SECTUR, 2015).
Due to the importance gastronomy has currently gained and the
interest of chefs, artists, academics and scientists in this discipline, new
concepts have emerged in this field (Fooladi, Hopia, Lasa, & Arboleya,
2019) on the basis of the application of science in cooking, commonly
called ‘molecular gastronomy’ (Barham et al., 2010); from the neu-
roscience area to understanding of why food has a certain flavor, nor-
mally called ‘neurogastronomy’ (Shepherd, 2012; Spence, 2016;
Fooladi et al., 2019) or ‘gastrophysics’ (Spence, 2018), which have
addressed the experience of human feeding from the areas of psy-
chology and sensory analysis.
The above mentioned reasons together with the fact that a large part
of gastronomy concepts were established long ago, make it more
complex to conceptualize it. In this sense, understanding the concept of
gastronomy is crucial for its promotion, taking into account gastronomy
is one of the main motivators that influence people to travel to a given
destination (Berbel-Pineda, Palacios-Florencio, Ramírez-Hurtado, &
Santos-Roldán, 2019) and there is no information, to our knowledge,
about the most relevant cognitive elements of people in relation to this
discipline.
The Theory of Social Representations (TSR) proposed by Serge
Moscovici (1988) can help understand concepts that are not well de-
fined or lack a clear structure at a conceptual level (Rodrigues,
Ballester, Saenz-Navajas, & Valentin, 2015). Moscovici (1988) states
social representations are a universe of opinions. Conceptually, ‘social
representation’ is a particular form of knowledge that functions as
communication between a group of individuals and has a significant
influence on their behaviors (Mora, 2002). Social representations are a
form of knowledge within which who knows is placed within what
knows (Mora, 2002).
According to Farr (1984), a social representation is a system of
ideas, beliefs, and practices with a double function; first, to establish an
order that allows people to orient themselves in their material and
social world; and second, to enable communication among members of
a social group to name and unambiguously classify various aspects of
their world and their individual and group history. For Páez (1987),
social representations are a form of natural thoughts of people that are
not formalized or institutionalized.
Moscovici (1988) establishes three dimensions that are part of the
social representations of people. The first is ‘Information’ and refers to
the sum of knowledge that a group has about a social event, fact or
phenomenon. This dimension is related to the wealth of data or ex-
planations people have about a social object and how they organize
them. The second one is the ‘Field of representation’, which refers to the
content of information in a hierarchical way a group or different social
groups have about an object. This dimension allows to see the character
of the content and the qualitative or imaginative properties of social
representation. The third dimension is ‘Attitude’, which is related to the
favorable or unfavorable orientation people have towards an object
(Mora, 2002) and that is part of their predisposition to carry out some
behavior (Urala & Lähteenmäki, 2004).
In the case of consumer behavior, in a food-related context, the TSR
helps the construction of meanings connected to food, which are an
inherent part of people or social groups (Lo Monaco & Bonetto, 2019).
For example, this theory has been used to study people's perception,
knowledge, beliefs or values towards new foods (Backstrom, Pirtilla-
Backman, & Tuorila, 2003), genetically modified organisms (Ribeiro,
Barone, & Beherns, 2016), consumer attitudes towards edible flowers
(Rodrigues et al., 2017), the role of regional culture in the social
2
Food Quality and Preference 83 (2020) 103930
representation of edible insects (Bisconsin-Júnior et al., 2020) and
particular characteristics of beverages, such as ‘minerality’ of wine
among experts and consumers (Rodrigues et al., 2015).
On the other hand, methodologies to evaluate the language of
people towards food products they consume have changed from the
traditional descriptive analysis to qualitative methods based on the
language of consumer (Rodrigues et al., 2015). In addition, a direct
interaction with consumers through qualitative research techniques
allows to obtain knowledge, perceptions, opinions, beliefs or feelings
towards an object of study that would be difficult to obtain by means of
structured questionnaires (Ribeiro et al., 2016).
For example, the use of projective techniques, such as Word
Association (WA) technique, makes it possible to quickly and accurately
understand people's conceptual structures towards determined stimuli.
WA is a technique that consists of the spontaneous generation of words
from specific stimuli such as phrases, words or photos. In a food con-
text, WA allows to obtain the underlying elements people relate to
specific concepts and that serve for their conceptualization (Guerrero
et al., 2010). This technique has been used to conceptualize from
consumer language traditional foods (Guerrero et al., 2010), functional
foods (Rojas-Rivas, Espinoza-Ortega, Martínez-García, Moctezuma-
Pérez, & Thomé-Ortiz, 2018), ultra-processed food products (Ares et al.,
2016; Aguirre, Borneo, Khori, & Borneo, 2019), the concept of well-
being in a food related-context (Ares et al., 2014) and recently the
sustainability (Barone, Rodrigues, Noguiera, de Queiroz, & Herman,
2020).
Open-Ended (OE) questions consist of asking for an opinion or
comment towards a specific domain in order to obtain spontaneous
answers. Different disciplines such as medicine, politics, social sciences,
and marketing have implemented this type of qualitative techniques
(Symoneaux & Galmarini, 2014). In particular, in the field of sensory
science, OE questions have been used to generate sensory profiles (Ares
& Varela, 2014). According to ten Kleij and Musters (2003), this tech-
nique provides a richness of information and can complement the de-
scription of consumer preferences towards food (Symoneaux &
Galmarini, 2014). Furthermore, this technique has been used to mea-
sure the preferences of people towards specific food products (ten Kleij
& Musters, 2003; Symoneaux, Galmarini, & Mehinagic, 2012; Aguirre
et al., 2019; Rojas-Rivas, Espinoza-Ortega, Thomé-Ortiz, Moctezuma-
Pérez, & Cuffia, 2019).
Finally, the Free Listing (FL) task is a simple procedure that involves
asking people or participants to list things, words, characteristics or
qualities about a specific cultural domain (Sutrop, 2001; Hough &
Ferraris, 2010). Cultural domain is the study of the way people think
about lists of things that, in some way, are related to one another (se-
mantic fields). Observable or conceptual physical elements such as
words, feelings or beliefs can be obtained through FL (Hough & Ferraris,
2010). This technique is frequently used in the area of sociology and
anthropology. However, in the field of sensory science, it has gained
great relevance since it allows to define cultural domains or char-
acteristics of foods (Libertino, Ferraris, López, & Hough, 2012). For
example, Hough and Ferraris (2010) introduced this method in the
journal of Food Quality and Preference to obtain insights into a food
category among high, middle and low income consumers using Cog-
nitive Salience Index (CSI). CSI is a measure that structures the most
important salient terms of a cultural domain, which ranges between 0
and 1. The FL task has been used together with the CSI to understand
which foods are conceptualized as ultra-processed by consumers (Ares
et al., 2016; Aguirre et al., 2019), what are the specific sensory char-
acteristics of foods (Antmann et al., 2011), how packaging influences
consumer perception (Ares & Deliza, 2010), the associated menus
among populations of different income levels (Libertino et al., 2012),
and to describe the different ways of feeding people (Smith-Morris,
2016; Muñoz, Fontalba-Navas, Arrebola, & Larrea-Killinger, 2019). In
that sense, the Free Listing task could be very useful to define cultural
domain in terms of foods, ingredients and dishes representative of
E. Rojas-Rivas, et al.
Mexican cuisine.
This research focuses on how chefs and consumers define the con-
cept of gastronomy and the cultural domain of Mexican cuisine.
Gastronomy is a fundamental activity in the country, which suggests
that both groups (chefs and consumers) have an extensive knowledge
on the subject. In addition, although experts can have a clearer and
more accurate knowledge of the characteristics or concepts of foods
(Pagliuca & Scarpato, 2014), descriptions made by consumers can be
useful and contain important meanings (Rodrigues et al., 2015). Fur-
thermore, methodologies on the description or conceptualization of
food characteristics are not only carried out on the language of experts;
consumers also provide important information in the evaluation of their
characteristics (Rodrigues et al., 2015). Many studies establish that
descriptions or perceptions make by consumers have some consistency
for those made among experts (Worch, Lê, & Punter, 2010; Jaeger et al.,
2018).
To our knowledge, this is the first study that investigates the per-
ception towards the concept of ‘gastronomy’ and Mexican cuisine
among experts and consumers, in a context where gastronomy is a
fundamental piece in the economy, geography and culture of a country.
1.1. Aim and research questions
The aim of this work was to study how chefs and consumers define
the concept of gastronomy and the cultural domain of Mexican cuisine
using the Theory of Social Representations. For this, the following re-
search questions were formulated and addressed:
RQ1: What is the social representation among chefs and consumers
towards the concept of gastronomy and the cultural domain of Mexican
cuisine?
RQ2: Are there differences in the social representation of how chefs
and consumers define the concept of gastronomy and the cultural do-
main of Mexican cuisine?
RQ3: Are there differences in the social representation of the con-
cept of gastronomy among consumers according to their socio-
demographic characteristics (gender, age and educational level)?
2. Material and methods
2.1. Place of study and participants
The study was carried out in two phases. For the first phase, 22
semi-structured interviews with chefs were carried out
(Age = 39.04 ± 9.80; Age range = 25–58; Gender:
Female = 36.40%, Male = 63.60%) from public and private schools of
gastronomy in Mexico. The level of education of the chefs was: 13.6%
Technical Level, 41.0% Bachelor and 45.4% Postgraduate.
In the second phase, a convenience sampling was carried out
(Guerrero et al., 2010) in which 329 consumers from Central Mexico
were recruited (Age = 31.44 ± 12.76; Age range = 18–78; Gender:
Female = 43.40%, Male = 56.60%). 48.32% were people between 18
and 25 years old, 22.79% between 26 and 35 years old, 11.24% be-
tween 36 and 46 years old, and 17.62% of 46 years old or older. 12.20%
of the sample had low level of education, 60.80% middle and 27.10%
high level of education.
The chefs were interviewed in the Professional School of
Gastronomy of the University of Ixtlahuaca, Mexico, while consumers
were surveyed in two capital cities of Central Mexico. The study was
approved by the Research Coordination of the University under the
project number 0519.
2.2. Semi-structured interviews
An interview guide was designed and applied to 22 chefs from
different gastronomy schools in Mexico. The criteria for the recruitment
of chefs were: i) having at least five years of experience in the
3
Food Quality and Preference 83 (2020) 103930
gastronomic field; and, ii) being professors at a public or private uni-
versity in the country. Most of the chefs interviewed exercise their
profession apart from being professors of the schools. For example, the
sample was composed of two pastry chefs, one bakery chef, one chef
and sommelier, one ice sculptor chef and 13 culinary chefs. Only four
chefs work exclusively as professors in the schools.
The number of chefs interviewed was defined out of convenience,
taking into account the availability and interest of the participants.
Several studies have used this similar number of experts to study dif-
ferent concepts or characteristics of food, beverages and other aspects
(Haddaji, Albors-Garrigós, & García-Sogovia, 2017; Laneyrie, Landry, &
Rouat, 2019; Eschevins, Giboreau, Julien, & Dacremont, 2019; Palczak
et al., 2020). For example, Haddaji et al. (2017) investigated the success
and limiting factors in the experience of female chefs. Eschevins et al.
(2019) interviewed 20 experts to define the basic principles for food
and beer and wine pairing. Frøst, Giacalone, and Rasmussen (2015)
tested alternative methods of sensory evaluation among 26 chefs and
food experts. Palckzak et al. (2020) studied among ten pastry and cu-
linary chefs how they define the term ‘complexity’ in the gastronomic
field. Furthermore, these same authors (Palczak, Giboreau, Rogeaux, &
Delarue, 2020) analyzed the complexity of gastronomic dishes within a
sample of 150 consumers. In that sense, the number of chefs inter-
viewed in this study is adequate to find out how they build and define
the concept of gastronomy and the cultural domain of Mexican cuisine,
in addition to the fact that most of the chefs interviewed exercise their
profession, as described above.
At the beginning of the interview, the participants were informed
the audios of the interviews would be recorded and the information
would be used only for scientific purposes (Roascio-Albistur, Gámbaro,
& Ivankovich, 2019). The first part of the interview was an OE question,
which consisted in the following: ‘From your perception, how would
you define the concept of gastronomy?’. The second question consisted
of a FL task where they had to mention all the dishes, foods or in-
gredients they considered representative of Mexican cuisine. The in-
terviews lasted between 10 and 15 min. Sociodemographic character-
istics of the participants were collected.
2.3. Survey and questionnaire
A face-to-face questionnaire was designed and applied to 329 con-
sumers in two capital cities of Central Mexico. The selection criteria for
the participants were: i) being over 18 years old; and ii) having avail-
ability and interest in participating in the study (Rojas-Rivas et al.,
2018). The questionnaire contained three sections: the first one applied
WA technique and consisted of the participants mentioning the first
four words that came to their minds with the word ‘Gastronomy’ as
stimulus. In the second section of the questionnaire, they were asked to
mention all foods, dishes or ingredients they considered part of Mexican
cuisine. Finally, the third section involved collecting sociodemographic
characteristics of the sample such as gender, age and educational level.
2.4. Data analysis
The analysis of the information obtained was performed according
to each technique used, both in interviews with chefs and in ques-
tionnaires applied to consumers. The analysis of information is speci-
fically described as follows:
Open-ended question: content analysis of words, comments or
phrases was performed. The content analysis was done by removing
connectors between phrases and looking for the most frequent terms
mentioned in the answers for later grouping them into categories
through the lemmatization process (Symoneaux et al., 2012;
Symoneaux & Galmarini, 2014). This process was carried out by three
experts in the area of food science, who initially worked independently
to subsequently reach a consensus on the final name of the categories
obtained. The categories mentioned by more than 5% of the sample
E. Rojas-Rivas, et al. Food Quality and Preference 83 (2020) 103930

were considered for subsequent analysis, regardless of whether the
words came from the same or different participants (Aguirre et al.,
2019; Rojas-Rivas et al., 2019).
Word Association: The words mentioned were included in a da-
tabase in Excel for analysis following the methodological procedures of
Guerrero et al. (2010). Subsequently, the words were grouped into
categories based on the lemmatization process (Symoneaux et al., 2012)
and the frequency of mention of each of the categories obtained was
calculated. The categories were analyzed according to socio-
demographic characteristics of the consumers (gender, age, educational
level) through Global Chi Square and Per Cell Chi Square tests. Finally,
Correspondence Analysis was carried out to graphically visualize the
social representations of the categories formed according to socio-
demographic characteristics of the sample. The analysis were per-
formed with XLSTAT 2014 (Addinsoft).
Free Listing: Foods, dishes or ingredients mentioned by chefs and
consumers were included in an Excel database and analyzed following
the methodological procedures of Hough and Ferraris (2010). The foods
mentioned by over 5% were selected to obtain the Cognitive Salience
Index (CSI) (Sutrop, 2001). For this, the minimum, maximum, mention
frequency, and average position of each food or dish in the list (Hough
& Ferraris, 2010; Aguirre et al., 2019) of chefs and consumers were
calculated. The CSI was calculated with the following formula:
CSI = F/N mP
where F = is the number of participants who mentioned the term (in
this case food or ingredient), N = is the total of participants, and
mP = is the average position of each food or ingredient in the list of
participants. The formula considers the frequency (F) at which each
food or ingredient was mentioned in the list and the weight of the
average position (mP) in which the food or ingredients were named. If
all study participants mention the same ingredient or food, then F = N
and the average food position is 1. In that sense the CSI is also 1. The
foods or ingredients mentioned at the end of the lists and less frequently
have a value close to 0, while those that are not mentioned, theoreti-
cally have a CSI = 0.
The information obtained from the CSI was presented in a sedi-
mentation chart. This type of graph shows in descending order the most
representative elements of a specific cultural domain. Likewise, when a
‘break point’ is identified in the graph, the most important aspects of
the study domain are established (Aguirre et al., 2019).
3. Results
3.1. Chefs’ perception of gastronomy concept
Through the open-ended question, there were obtained 12 cate-
gories that reflect the perception of the chefs towards the concept of
gastronomy (Table 1). The first category was named ‘Culture’, in this
category, the most frequent words were: tradition, traditional, identity,
and culture. The second most mentioned category was ‘Food’ and the
most common words were: feeding, food, foods or meal. ‘Methods,
techniques and ingredients’ was mentioned 22 times and refers to the
utensils and raw material for food processing. The category ‘Human’
refers to the relationship between human and food. As for the ‘Terri-
tory’ category, chefs consider gastronomy to be part of a specific place,
whether at the local, regional or national level. ‘Kitchen’ was mentioned
10 times, this category refers to the act of preparing food. Finally, the
categories of least mention were ‘Art’, ‘Science’, ‘Consumption’, ‘Agri-
cultural field’, ‘Emotions’ and ‘Health and nutrition’.
3.2. Principal foods, dishes and ingredients of Mexican cuisine
Table 2 shows the foods, dishes and ingredients considered by chefs
to be part of Mexican cuisine. A brief description, its frequency of
mention, the average position of mention and the Cognitive Salience
Index are also shown.
Chefs mentioned 17 foods and ingredients which, according to their
perception, are those that represent Mexican cuisine. The most im-
portant ingredient was ‘Corn’ (CSI = 0.394), which is one of the es-
sentials for preparing Mexican foods. The second food in order of im-
portance was ‘Chili’, which is also a base product of Mexican cuisine
used in a large number of culinary preparations in all regions of the
country. This product had the highest CSI after corn (CSI = 0.219). It is
noteworthy that great proportion of the foods mentioned are un-
processed products or do not involve any culinary preparation.
However, there were six foods mentioned by the experts (as described
as follows), which involve a culinary or transformation process and are
emblematic preparations of Mexican cuisine (Table 2).
The first of these was ‘Mole’, (CSI = 0.194) which is a traditional
preparation composed of a mixture of chilies, spices and condiments,
usually accompanied by chicken protein. This dish is an essential part of
the foods Mexican population perceives as traditional (Serrano-Cruz,
Espinoza-Ortega, Sepúlveda, Vizcarra-Bordi, & Thomé-Ortiz, 2018).
Mexican ‘Antojitos’ are also representative of Mexican cuisine, as they
were mentioned by gastronomy experts. According to Iturriaga (2013),
‘Antojitos’ are an essential part of Mexican culture, as they are products
that can be found in established prestigious restaurants or on the
streets. ‘Tortilla’ was the third processed food mentioned. For Calleja
and Basilia (2016), tortilla is an element of culinary identity among
Mexicans; it is a fundamental part of ‘Antojitos’ and accompanies the
vast majority of food or Mexican dishes. Finally, ‘Barbacoa’ and ‘Car-
nitas’ are preparations made with lamb and pork meat, respectively. In
the case of ‘Barbacoa’, it is one of the most emblematic traditional foods
of Central Mexico. This traditional food attracts consumers from Mexico
City, who travel to some states of Central Mexico to consume it (Thomé-
Ortíz, 2018).
From the sedimentation graph, (Fig. 1) it can be seen that the
‘breaking point’ is in ‘nopal’, which suggests that the first six foods
(corn, chili, mole, beans, pumpkin and nopal) are the most

Table 1
Categories obtained from the language of the chefs from the open-ended question.
Category More relevant words Number of mentions

Culture Tradition, traditional, traditions, culture 33

Feeding Feeding, food, foods, meal 22
Methods, techniques and ingredients Techniques, ingredients, preparations, elaborations 22
Human Man, human being, society, people, persons 15
Territory Territory, region, locality, regions, environment 14
Cuisine Cuisine, cooking, baking 10
Art Art, culinary art 8
Science Science, history, anthropology 7
Consumption Consumption, consumer, consume 7
Agricultural field Farming, harvesting, cultivating, agricultural 5
Emotions and feelings Emotions, feelings 4
Health and nutrition Nutrition, health 4

4
E. Rojas-Rivas, et al. Food Quality and Preference 83 (2020) 103930

Table 2
Frequency of mention, average position and Cognitive Salience Index (CSI) of the foods and ingredients mentioned by the chefs from the Free Listing task.
Food Frequency Average Position CSI Description

Corn 15 1.73 0.394 Original Mexican cereal. It is the base of Mexican population food. There are more than 300 species in the country.
Chili 15 3.11 0.219 Basic ingredient of Mexican cuisine, which has different levels of spice. It is consumed fresh or dried.
Mole* 9 2.11 0.194 Traditional Mexican dish. It consists of a sauce made from a mixture of peppers, spices and condiments.
Bean 12 3.50 0.156 Seed that is part of the legume family. Mexico is the center of the origin and cultivation of this seed.
Pumpkin 10 4.00 0.114 Fruit of the Cucurbitaceae family. It has different sizes and shapes and is a basic ingredient of Mexican food.
Nopal 5 3.20 0.071 Fruit of the plant of the same name. It belongs to the family of cacti and is consumed raw and cooked.
Mexican ‘Antojitos’* 8 5.37 0.068 Traditional preparations mainly made of corn and wheat generally consumed in informal environments (tortas,
tamales, tacos, pambazos, etc.)
Jitomate 7 5.00 0.064 Fruit of the Solanaceae family. It is ovoid in shape and red when mature.
Quelites 4 3.75 0.048 Young plants of immature leaves. They have stems, buds or edible flowers and are consumed raw or cooked.
Tortilla* 5 4.80 0.047 Main product derived from corn. It is flat and circular, made in an artisanal or industrial way.
Chia 1 1.00 0.045 Seed native from Southern Mexico. It has high nutritional value and is considered a functional food.
Pozole* 3 4.00 0.034 Traditional dish from the state of Guerrero, made with corn grains and pork in a broth of chilis.
Maguey 2 3.00 0.030 Mexico characteristic plant from which fermented beverages such as pulque or distilled such as tequila and mezcal
are obtained.
Barbacoa* 3 5.00 0.027 Traditional dish from Central Mexico made with lamb meat and spices, wrapped in maguey pencas, cooked in an
oven under the ground.
Amaranth 3 5.00 0.027 Traditional seed from Central Mexico used mainly for the elaboration of ¨Alegrias¨. It is considered a functional
food.
Carnitas* 3 6.00 0.023 Traditional dish from the state of Michoacán that is made with pork cooked in its own fat.
Cacao 3 6.66 0.020 Fruit obtained from the tree of the same name that is used to make chocolate.

*Traditional dishes of Mexican cuisine.

representative ingredients or foods of Mexican cuisine according to the
perception of chefs through the Free Listing task. Aguirre et al. (2019)
showed that the most important foods mentioned through Free Listing
reflects the importance, knowledge and understanding of a cultural
domain among people.
3.3. Consumers’ perception of the concept of gastronomy
95.44% of the sample mentioned four words from the WA task. Only
15 participants mentioned three or less words. Verbal fluency in men-
tioning words towards given stimulus demonstrates the level of
knowledge people have about objects, things or concepts (Guerrero
et al., 2010). In that sense, the high number of mentions towards the
term ‘gastronomy’ shows people have a clear representation of the
concept, since access to the mental representation of the stimulus was
relatively easy (Guerrero et al., 2010).
On the other hand, through WA technique, there were obtained 20
categories that reflect the perception of Mexican consumers towards the
concept of gastronomy (Table 3) and the category of greatest mention
was ‘Culture’. This category refers to Mexican population considering
gastronomy an essential part of their culture as it reflects customs and
traditions of different contexts of Mexico.
The second category of greatest mention was ‘Hedonism’. This ca-
tegory refers to the pleasure and enjoyment people experience when
consuming food, since the most mentioned words were: tasty, rich,
delicious or delight. ‘Meal’ was the third category of greatest mention
and the most representative words were: meal and traditional meal. The
category named ‘Sensory aspects’ was the fourth most important. In this
category, reference is made to sensory characteristics of food. The ca-
tegory that refers to the processes of elaboration and / or production of
gastronomic products, as well as the ingredients and utensils used was
named ‘Methods, techniques and ingredients’ and was mentioned 72
times.
The sixth category of greatest mention was ‘Cuisine’ and was asso-
ciated with words such as: cuisine, cooking and cooking food. ‘Feeding’
was mentioned 62 times by the sample. The categories ‘Identity’, ‘Art’
and ‘Emotions and feelings’ are noteworthy and can be conceived as
intangible aspects that food or culinary dishes project. ‘Health and

0.45

0.40

0.35

0.30

0.25

0.20

0.15

0.10

0.05

0.00

Fig. 1. Cognitive Salience Index of foods or ingredients mentioned by chefs from the Free Listing task.

5
E. Rojas-Rivas, et al. Food Quality and Preference 83 (2020) 103930

Table 3
Categories obtained from the Word Association technique based on the consumer survey.
Category More relevant words Number of mentions

Culture Culture, cultures, tradition, traditions, traditional, habit, habits. 189

Hedonism Tasty, delicious, delight, appetizing. 113
Meal Meal, traditional meal 102
Sensory aspects Flavor, flavors, texture, textures, odor, color, colors, freshness. 83
Methods, techniques and ingredients Technique, techniques, procedures, process, cuisine techniques, elaborations, production. 72
Cuisine Cuisine, cooking, chef, cooking foods, gourmet. 67
Feeding Feeding, feed, eat, stomach. 62
Foods and beverages Foods, beverages, water, bread, dessert, barbecue, mezcal, pulque. 56
Identity Mexico, Mexican, history, identity, root, roots, patrimony, folklore. 45
Art Art, culinary art, arts, art to cuisine, art of cooking. 40
Chefs Chef, chefs, professions. 29
Emotions and feelings Feelings, emotions, love, passion, pride, happiness. 29
Health and nutrition Health, healthy, wholesome, nutrition, nutritive, vitamins and minerals. 29
Innovation Innovation, innovate, creativity, creation, innovative. 24
Science Science, studies, research, meal studies, foods studies. 22
Dishes Dishes, typical dishes. 20
Society Society, town, towns, population, people, ethnicities. 18
Territory Country, countries, region, regions, local, location. 18

nutrition’ was an aspect of medium relevance in the perception of
Mexican consumers. Finally, the categories of lowest mention were
related with the conception of gastronomy as science, innovation, so-
ciety, as well as the place where gastronomy ingredients or dishes are
made or come from.
3.4. Consumers’ perception of the foods, ingredients or dishes of Mexican
cuisine
Table 4 shows the foods and ingredients mentioned by more than
5% of the sample. A brief description, the frequency of mention of each
of the ingredients or dishes, together with the average position and the
CSI are also shown.
Thirty foods, ingredients or dishes were obtained that, according to
the perception of Mexican consumers, represent the cultural domain of
national cuisine. It is worth mentioning that a great proportion of the
list obtained in Table 4 were traditional dishes or beverages (N = 22)
that must undergo some processes for them to be obtained; unlike in-
gredients such as corn, chili, beans, nopal or pumpkin, which are in-
gredients used for the elaboration of numerous dishes of Mexican cui-
sine.
‘Mole’ (CSI = 0.216) and ‘Pozole’ (CSI = 0.196) were the most

Table 4
Frequency of mention, average position and Cognitive Salience Index (CSI) of the foods and ingredients mentioned by consumers from the Free Listing task.
Food (s) Frequency of Mention Average Position CSI Description

Mole 164 2.30 0.216 *

Pozole 149 2.31 0.196 *
Tacos 129 2.81 0.140 Food that is prepared with corn tortilla, stuffed with some preparation, folded or rolled.
Chile en nogada 70 2.53 0.084 Traditional seasonal dish from the state of Puebla, made with poblano pepper, stuffed with meat and with
nut sauce.
Enchiladas 78 3.10 0.076 Traditional dish made with corn tortillas dipped in red or green sauce.
Corn 70 2.93 0.073 *
Tamales 82 3.49 0.071 Preparation of pre-Hispanic origin made with corn dough, with some filling and wrapped in corn husks
Chili (ingredient) 58 2.62 0.067 *
Tlacoyos 50 3.58 0.042 ‘Antojito’ made with thick corn tortilla dough filled with beans.
Bean 43 3.47 0.038 *
Chilaquiles 37 3.54 0.033 Traditional dish made with triangular-shaped fried corn tortillas bathed in red or green sauce.
Pambazos 41 3.83 0.033 ‘Antojito’ similar to a torta prepared with bread of the same name, fried or roasted.
Tortillas 36 3.39 0.032 *
Quesadillas 44 4.25 0.031 Mexican ‘Antojito’ consisting of a corn tortilla folded in half and filled with some cheese.
Quelites 39 4.28 0.028 *
Pulque 41 4.78 0.026 Traditional fermented beverage from Central Mexico obtained from the agave plant.
Broths 32 3.81 0.026 Liquid preparation obtained from cooking meat, vegetables and salt in water.
Barbacoa 32 4.59 0.021 *
Nopal 28 4.36 0.020 *
Carnitas 29 4.59 0.019 *
Toasts 19 3.68 0.016 ‘Antojitos’ made from crunchy corn tortillas. Can be eaten alone or with stew.
Gorditas 22 4.41 0.015 ‘Antojitos’ made with thick corn tortilla dough filled with beans.
Rice 19 4.21 0.014 Grain native from Asia. Traditionally browned in oil with onion, garlic and salt before boiling it.
Chocolate 18 4.11 0.013 Drink of pre-Hispanic origin based on dissolved cacao and mixed with water or milk.
Cochinita Pibil 18 4.22 0.013 Traditional dish from Southeastern Mexico made with pork, orange juice and spices. It is cooked similarly
to barbacoa.
Tortas 19 4.53 0.013 Mexican ‘Antojito’ made with wheat bread (bolillo or telera) stuffed with different ingredients.
Pumpkin 17 4.35 0.012 *
Tlayuda 20 5.30 0.011 Traditional dish from the state of Oaxaca based on corn tortilla 30 cm in diameter, accompanied by
different ingredients.
Tequila 23 6.39 0.011 Distilled alcoholic beverage originated in the state of Jalisco, obtained from the Agave Tequilana Weber.
Insects 19 5.84 0.010 *

*Descriptions detailed in Table 2.

6
E. Rojas-Rivas, et al. Food Quality and Preference 83 (2020) 103930

mentioned dishes among Mexican consumers and presented the highest
CSI. It is noteworthy that, much of the dishes mentioned are part of the
so-called Mexican ‘Antojitos’ and also make up the perceptual threshold
of Mexican cuisine among consumers. For example, ‘tacos, tortas, ta-
males, tlacoyos, pambazos, quesadillas, tostadas, gorditas, chilaquiles
and enchiladas’ are part of this food category.
The most important traditional Mexican dishes were also mentioned
by consumers, for example ‘Chile en nogada’, which is a traditional
preparation from the state of Puebla and is widely consumed in Central
Mexico during the celebration of national holidays. ‘Tortilla’ is another
representative food of Mexican cuisine. According to Espejel-García,
Mora-Flores, García-Salazar, Pérez-Elizalde, and García-Mata (2016)
tortilla is the main food of the Mexican consumer since a large amount
of essential nutrients are obtained from it.
Finally, the most cited drinks by consumers were ‘pulque’ and ‘te-
quila’. These results suggest that people consider pulque (CSI = 0.026)
as the main traditional beverage of Mexican cuisine, well above tequila
(CSI = 0.011). Rojas-Rivas, Viesca-González, Favila-Cisneros, and
Cuffia (2020) establish that pulque is a fermented beverage currently
experiencing a process of revaluation among Mexican consumers,
especially youngsters who seem to be more sensitive to traditional
Mexican foods and beverages.
Fig. 2 shows the main foods that represent Mexican cuisine from the
perception of consumers. Furthermore, the ‘break point’ is found in the
ingredient ‘Chili’ (CSI = 0.067). In that sense, ‘mole, pozole, tacos,
chile en nogada, enchiladas, corn and tamales’ are the foods that define
the cultural domain of the aforementioned cuisine.
3.5. Influence of gender, age and educational level on consumers’ perception
of gastronomy
Through the Global Chi Square test, the frequency of mention of the
categories was analyzed according to sociodemographic characteristics
of the sample. No differences were found with gender (P = 0.595).
However, in terms of age (P ≤ 0.001) and level of education
(P = 0.041) there were found statistically significant differences.
Therefore, with the Chi Square Per Cell test, the contingency table was
inspected to identify the source of variation (Table 5).
The youngest group (18–25) related more to the ‘Innovation’ cate-
gory, while ‘Foods and beverages’ and ‘Health and nutrition’ were
mentioned less by this group. The group between 26 and 35 years old
associated ‘Feeding’ and ‘Innovation’ categories significantly less. The
36–45 year-old group mentioned ‘Foods and beverages’ category in
greater proportion; while the eldest group (46 or older) did so for
‘Feeding’ category. Regarding level of education, the lowest level group
associated significantly more the ‘Food and beverages’ category unlike
the group with middle level of education. This last group was char-
acterized by relating to ‘Innovation’, unlike the group with higher level
of education, which did so to a lesser extent.
Correspondence Analysis shows social representations that age and
educational groups have towards the concept of gastronomy (Fig. 3).
The first and second factors explained 46.58% and 27.02% of the var-
iance, respectively. The 18 to 25 year-old group was positioned closer
to ‘Identity, Feedings, Emotions and feelings, Science, Art and Innova-
tion’ categories, while the eldest group was closer to ‘Dishes, Cuisine,
Society and Methods, techniques and ingredients’ categories. Finally,
the 26–35 year-old group was closer to ‘Hedonism, Sensory aspects and
Chefs’ categories, and the 36–45 year-old group was positioned around
‘Food and beverages and Territory’. These results suggest that social
representations of the concept of gastronomy differ according to the age
of consumers. In addition, each age group searches for particular
characteristics of gastronomy.
Finally, with respect of level of education the group of low level was
closer to ‘Territory and Food and beverages’ categories. The partici-
pants with middle level of education were closer to ‘Innovation, Art,
Identity, Feeding, Science, Culture and Methods, techniques and in-
gredients’ categories; while the group with high educational level pre-
sented a very different perception of the other two groups, since it

0.25

0.20

0.15

0.10

0.05

0.00
Chocolate
Tostadas

Cochinita pibil

Pumpkin
Rice

Insects
Enchiladas

Tlacoyos
Bean

Quesadillas

Tlayuda
Tequila
Chile en nogada

Corn

Barbacoa
Nopal

Gorditas

Tortas
Chilaquiles
Pambazos

Pulque
Mole

Carnitas
Pozole

Chili (ingredient)

Quelites
Tacos

Tamales

Broths
Tortillas

Fig. 2. Cognitive Salience Index (CSI) of the foods most mentioned by consumers based on the Free Listing task.

7
E. Rojas-Rivas, et al. Food Quality and Preference 83 (2020) 103930

Table 5
Frequency of mention of the categories according to the age and educational level of the sample (N = 329).
Category 18–25 26–35 36–45 46 or older Low Middle High
N = 159 N = 75 N = 37 N = 58 N = 40 N = 200 N = 89

Culture 98 46 21 24 24 108 57
Hedonism 48 34 14 17 6 71 36
Meal 50 25 15 12 11 67 24
Sensory aspects 38 24 7 14 7 46 30
Methods, techniques and ingredients 36 15 5 16 5 50 17
Cuisine 33 17 1(−) 16 2(−) 42 23
Feeding 32 5(−) 4 21(+) 5 44 13
Foods and beverages 18(−) 12 16(+) 10 12(+) 27(−) 17
Identity 25 12 2 6 4 32 9
Art 25 7 3 5 3 27 10
Chefs 13 7 4 5 3 16 10
Emotions and feelings 16 7 0(−) 6 3 21 5
Health and nutrition 7(−) 10 5 7 3 15 11
Innovation 20(+) 1(−) 2 1 2 21(+) 1(−)
Science 12 3 4 3 1 17 4
Dishes 9 5 1 5 2 12 6
Society 9 6 0(−) 3 0(−) 11 7
Territory 6 6 3 3 4 8 6

Values (+) or (−) indicate whether the observed frequency was higher or lower compared to the theoretical frequencies according to the Per Cell Chi Square test.

0.5
Innovation

0.4

0.3

Science 36-45
Low
0.2
Foods and beverages
F2 (27.02 %)

Meal
Art
0.1
18-25
Identity Culture
Feeding
Middle
Emotions and feelings
0

Methods, techniques and

ingredients Chefs Territory

-0.1 Dishes Hedonism

Sensory aspects
46 or older 26-35
-0.2 Cuisine
High
Health and nutrition

Society
-0.3
-0.7 -0.6 -0.5 -0.4 -0.3 -0.2 -0.1 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6
F1 (46.58 %)

Fig. 3. Correspondence Analysis of the categories according to age and educational level of consumers.

8
E. Rojas-Rivas, et al.
related to: ‘Health and nutrition, Hedonism, Chefs and Sensory aspects’.
These results indicate that the group with higher educational level as-
sociated the distinctive characteristics of the concept of gastronomy,
while the other two groups associated the concept with elements re-
lated to feeding and with methods and techniques of food preparation.
4. Discussion
The aim of this work was to explore social representations of
Mexican chefs and consumers towards the concept of ‘gastronomy’ and
the cultural domain of Mexican cuisine. For this, two qualitative tech-
niques were used to study the aforementioned concept: Open-Ended
question with chefs and Word Association with consumers. On the other
hand, the cultural domain of ‘Mexican cuisine’ was explored with the
Free Listing task between two groups studied. According to Ribeiro
et al. (2016) this type of techniques allow to obtain valuable informa-
tion from consumers regarding their knowledge, opinions or perception
towards specific objects of study. ten Kleij and Musters (2003) establish
that qualitative techniques allow to know from the language of people
the most relevant elements towards the description of a food product
and to identify the elements that guide its form and intention of con-
sumption.
Results indicate both chefs and consumers had a similar perception
of the concept of ‘gastronomy’ since the category of greatest mention
was ‘Culture’, which suggests they considered this concept as a social
representation linked to the culture. These results suggest that both
experts and consumers have similarities in the perception and con-
struction of concepts that are not well defined. However, there are
elements (categories) that are organized differently at the cognitive
level. For example, the category ‘Hedonism’ was not mentioned by
chefs, although this aspect is one of the main drivers in the choice and
consumption of food among Mexican consumers (Rojas-Rivas et al.,
2018). Another example is ‘Health and nutrition’ category, which was
the one of minor importance among chefs, but not among consumers.
Nevertheless, it can be seen that in both groups, ‘Gastronomy’ is a social
representation strongly related to culture, feeding, hedonism, sensory
aspects and particular methods, techniques and ingredients that are
central to food preparation.
Sociodemographic characteristics enable us to observe social re-
presentations the different consumer groups have. For example, the
eldest groups (36–45 and 46 or older) associate gastronomy with: ter-
ritory, cuisine, territory, particular foods and beverages, methods,
techniques and ingredients of food preparation, and health and nutri-
tion aspects. Furthermore, the level of education of participants allows
us to visualize that the groups with the highest education level have a
clearer social representation by linking gastronomy with hedonism;
health and nutrition; cuisine, chefs and sensory characteristics of foods.
The social representations of the concept of gastronomy together
with the sociodemographic characteristics of the consumers establish
that the groups with the highest educational level and of middle age
onwards have greater clarity of the concept. These results have some
consistency with those reported by Vanhonacker, Lengard, Hersleth,
and Verbeke (2010) who claim that middle-aged people onwards with
high educational level usually consume traditional food and enjoy
preparing it. For them, health is essential when choosing this type of
food.
On the other hand, many of the mentioned foods from the Free
Listing task are considered ‘traditional’ and are a representation of the
culture and gastronomic heritage of the different regions in Mexico. For
example, the cited dishes belong to different geographical areas of the
country. These results are agreeing with Guerrero et al. (2010) on the
conception of traditional foods and their importance in the gastronomic
heritage, whether at local, regional or national level. In addition, the
mentioned foods or ingredients are a social representation of the dif-
ferent geographical and cultural contexts of the country, an aspect that
needs to be analyzed in greater depth, since these representations may
9
Food Quality and Preference 83 (2020) 103930
differ according to the culture and influence of other cultures on the
social representation that people have of food (Bisconsin-Júnior et al.,
2020).
It is important to highlight two aspects from the results obtained by
the Free Listing task. The first one is that the conception of the in-
gredients or foods of Mexican cuisine among experts and consumers
was similar. The ingredients, ‘Mole’ and the so-called Mexican
‘Antojitos’ were mentioned by both groups. As regards ‘Mole’, Serrano-
Cruz et al. (2018) establish that this dish is the most important tradi-
tional food of Mexican cuisine in terms of consumers’ perception. Re-
garding Mexican ‘Antojitos’, although Gaona-Pineda et al. (2018) con-
sider them a group of foods not recommended for dieting, they have a
great cultural importance and are an important part of social re-
presentation of Mexican cuisine.
The Theory of Social Representations together with qualitative
techniques used in this research have enabled to obtain the perception
of Mexican consumers and chefs towards the concept of gastronomy.
The ‘Level of knowledge’ the study groups have is reflected in the ca-
tegories obtained from the Open-Ended question and Word Association
technique, as well as the foods mentioned within the Free Listing task.
With respect to the ‘Field of knowledge’ of the groups towards gastro-
nomy and Mexican cuisine, there were aspects that presented simila-
rities between both groups. However, there were differences in the way
of ranking them, even with the sociodemographic characteristics.
Finally, the results suggest a ‘Favorable attitude’ between chefs and
consumers, since the foods, words and categories obtained did not re-
flect a negative perception towards the concept of gastronomy and the
cultural domain of Mexican cuisine.
5. Limitations and future direction of research
Since this research was exploratory, it presents some limitations that
should be considered. First, the study was carried out in Central Mexico,
so future studies could explore social representations of Mexican cuisine
and gastronomy in other regions of the country, as these can be influ-
enced by geographical context and cultural influence (Bisconsin-Júnior
et al., 2020). Although the OE question and WA provided similar results
for the study of the concept of gastronomy among chefs and consumers,
WA allowed to obtain a greater number of analysis categories to de-
scribe the complexity of the concept. This may be because the number
of interviews with chefs was limited, so future research could explore
social representation of gastronomy with a greater number of chefs or
experts in the gastronomic field. Although the number of chefs inter-
viewed was limited, Sutrop (2001) states that it is necessary between 20
and 30 subjects to obtain CSI. However, it is necessary to validate these
results with a larger sample of experts from the gastronomic field.
6. Conclusions
This research explored the social representations that Mexican chefs
and consumers have of the concept of gastronomy and the foods asso-
ciated with the national cuisine. The results show that, at a conceptual
level, gastronomy is a social representation linked to the culture of a
society; the methods, techniques and ingredients of food preparation
are fundamental to its conception and represent the ways in which a
society feeds itself. Furthermore, gastronomy is a concept that relates to
the pleasure and enjoyment of food, where its sensory characteristics
are fundamental in its recognition.
Social representations of Mexican cuisine and gastronomy were si-
milar among chefs and consumers; nevertheless, each one hierarchizes
them differently. For example, the category named ‘Hedonism’ was not
mentioned among experts despite the fact this variable is one of the
main drivers in food choices of Mexican consumers. The TSR has en-
abled to explore the level of knowledge of the groups studied towards
the concept of gastronomy. Furthermore, social representation of chefs
and consumers towards gastronomy and Mexican cuisine was favorable,
E. Rojas-Rivas, et al.
since great part of the foods, dishes or ingredients mentioned by both
groups are representative of the national cuisine and are part of the
gastronomic heritage of Mexico.
Results of this research could be useful to public and private entities
for the conceptualization of gastronomy and its consolidation through a
conceptual framework since it is a new discipline that has gained in-
terest from diverse sectors of the population and its conception has only
been related so far to food preparation and consumption processes. As
reported in this research, experts and consumers consider other ele-
ments of importance in defining gastronomy.
Finally, according to our results, which attempt to contribute to the
consolidation of a conceptual framework of this discipline, the concept
of gastronomy for Mexican chefs and consumers could be defined as
follows: Gastronomy is a social representation linked to the culture of a
society, related to the ways or feeding, emotions and feelings along
with specific culinary methods and techniques for food preparation.
The foods, ingredients or dishes that are part of the gastronomy are
elaborated in a specific territory, where the pleasure of consuming them
together with their sensory characteristics are fundamental for their
recognition.
Declaration of competing interest
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect
to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The present work was financially supported by University of
Ixtlahuaca, Mexico (Project Number: 0519)
Author contributions
The work was planned by ERR and FC. Data analysis was performed
by ERR and ARD. JAFS contributed to data collection. ERR and FC
wrote the manuscript.
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