Proprioception in Injury Prevention and Rehabilitation: Mechanisms, Assessment, and Clinical Translation

Proprioception is essential for movement control, postural stability, coordination, and safe participation in sports and active living. After musculoskeletal injury, deficits in joint position sense, movement perception, force sense, balance, and sensorimotor integration may contribute to altered movement patterns, impaired performance, delayed recovery, and increased risk of recurrent injury. These problems are frequently discussed in conditions such as lateral ankle sprain, chronic ankle instability, anterior cruciate ligament injury and reconstruction, shoulder instability, tendinopathy, osteoarthritis, and other sports-related disorders.



Although proprioception has traditionally been viewed as a peripheral sensory problem, it is increasingly recognized as part of a broader sensorimotor system involving peripheral afferent input, spinal reflexes, supraspinal processing, cognitive control, psychological factors, and motor output. Pain, swelling, fatigue, visual dependence, fear of movement, and altered central nervous system function may further interact with proprioceptive deficits and influence rehabilitation outcomes.



Despite extensive research, several gaps remain. Proprioception is assessed using heterogeneous methods, and the clinical relevance of different tests remains unclear. The role of proprioceptive dysfunction in primary injury, reinjury, and return-to-sport outcomes also requires further clarification. In addition, while proprioceptive and neuromuscular training are widely used in rehabilitation and injury prevention, optimal training strategies, progression criteria, and mechanisms of effectiveness remain insufficiently established.



This Research Topic aims to bring together cutting-edge research on proprioception in sports injury prevention and rehabilitation. By integrating perspectives from sports medicine, rehabilitation science, neuroscience, biomechanics, motor control, and technology development, this collection seeks to advance the assessment, interpretation, and clinical application of proprioception-related research.



Scope and Sub-topics

We welcome original research, systematic reviews, meta-analyses, brief research reports, clinical trials, case reports, methods papers, perspectives, commentaries, opinions, and hypothesis or theory articles. Potential topics include, but are not limited to:

1. Mechanisms of proprioceptive dysfunction after sports-related musculoskeletal injury, including peripheral, spinal, supraspinal, neuromuscular, biomechanical, and psychological mechanisms.

2. Proprioception and injury risk, including studies on primary injury, reinjury, persistent symptoms, functional instability, and delayed recovery.

3. Assessment and measurement of proprioception, including joint position sense, threshold to detect passive motion, force sense, balance, perturbation responses, movement discrimination, and functional sensorimotor tasks.

4. Proprioception in specific sports injuries, such as lateral ankle sprain, chronic ankle instability, ACL injury and reconstruction, shoulder instability, tendinopathy, osteoarthritis, low back pain, and other musculoskeletal disorders.

5. Proprioceptive and neuromuscular rehabilitation, including balance training, perturbation training, motor control training, task-specific training, and criteria-based rehabilitation progression.

6. Technology-assisted assessment and intervention, including wearable sensors, force platforms, motion capture, virtual reality, augmented reality, robotics, artificial intelligence, EEG, TMS, fNIRS, fMRI and other emerging tools.

7. Clinical translation and return-to-sport decision-making, including how proprioceptive assessment and training can be integrated into injury prevention programs, rehabilitation pathways, and return-to-sport criteria.

Article types and fees

This Research Topic accepts the following article types, unless otherwise specified in the Research Topic description:

• Brief Research Report
• Case Report
• Clinical Trial
• Conceptual Analysis
• Data Report
• Editorial
• FAIR² Data
• General Commentary
• Hypothesis and Theory
• ... View all formats

Articles that are accepted for publication by our external editors following rigorous peer review incur a publishing fee charged to Authors, institutions, or funders.

Article types

This Research Topic accepts the following article types, unless otherwise specified in the Research Topic description:

• Brief Research Report
• Case Report
• Clinical Trial
• Conceptual Analysis
• Data Report
• Editorial
• FAIR² Data
• General Commentary
• Hypothesis and Theory
• Methods
• Mini Review
• Opinion
• Original Research
• Perspective
• Policy and Practice Reviews
• Policy Brief
• Registered Report
• Review
• Study Protocol
• Systematic Review
• Technology and Code

Keywords: Proprioception, sports injury, sensorimotor control, neuromuscular function, postural control, injury prevention, rehabilitation, return to sport.

Important note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.