EDITORIAL article
Front. Psychol.
Sec. Sport Psychology
This article is part of the Research TopicCombat Sports and Well-being: Prevention, Protection, and Development Across the Lifespan – Volume IIView all 10 articles
Editorial: Combat sports and well-being: prevention, protection, and development across the lifespan – volume II
Provisionally accepted
- 1Pegaso University, Naples, Italy
- 2Universita degli Studi di Roma Foro Italico Dipartimento di Scienze Motorie Umane e Della Salute, Rome, Italy
- 3Universita Telematica San Raffaele Roma, Rome, Italy
- 4Universitat Innsbruck, Innsbruck, Austria
- 5Univerzitet u Nisu, Niš, Serbia
- 6Universita degli Studi Gabriele d'Annunzio Chieti Pescara, Chieti, Italy
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The prevention, protection, and human development potential of combat sports and martial arts is increasingly being recognized. Building on the success of Volume I, Combat Sports and Well-being: Advancing Health and Inclusion in Athletes and Practitioners, this Research Topic, Volume II, gathers nine contributions that collectively advance conceptual understanding, identify possible psychosocial and neurophysiological mechanisms, and address implementation challenges across settings and age groups. In doing so, the Topic promotes a lifespan approach to well-being that considers safety, ethics, and the circumstances in which participation in combat sports can be beneficial rather than harmful. A first cluster of papers strengthens the theoretical foundations needed to interpret the paradox of "controlled combat" as a practice that may prevent violence while involving techniques that could be extremely effective and therefore have the potential to cause harm outside a regulated context. In particular, the theoretical article of Barreira et al., 2025 proposed a phenomenological framework that deals with "corporal fighting" as a distinctive lived experience, differentiating it from brawling and from play-fighting. Furthermore, the study emphasizes how training may cultivate reflective and ethical engagement through affective and empathic modulations. This contribution is complemented by another theoretical paper, Gabriel, 2025, which
Keywords: combat sports, Educational feasibility, inclusion, Intergenerational Judo, Psychological resources, resilience, Sport integrity, wellbeing
Received: 28 Dec 2025; Accepted: 02 Jan 2026.
Copyright: © 2026 Ciaccioni, Guidotti, Pocecco, Stankovic and Izzicupo. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Simone Ciaccioni
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