Hypermobility and Proprioception: Understanding Your Body’s Movement Awareness

By Russell Wolfe, MSc PT

As a hypermobile individual, have you been called clumsy? Does it take you longer than expected to learn exercise technique or sports skills? Do you bump into things on a regular basis? This isn’t always the case, but if any of this resonates with you, did you know that your hypermobility is likely playing a role?

To understand what’s going on here, first we need to talk a little bit about something called proprioception. Proprioception is a scientific term that refers to our innate and subconscious awareness of where our body is in space, and how our body is moving. It’s what allows us to reach for a light switch, even when we’re in a pitch black room and can’t see where our hand is going. It’s what helps us stay balanced on a bike, even if we’re looking over our shoulder at a car riding a little too close for comfort. Basically, it’s a useful perk of having a nervous system and allows us to move, balance, and act on our environment without the need for conscious and cognitive attention.

How does proprioception work? Here are the essentials.

Our tendons and ligaments connect to tiny receptors, aptly named proprioceptors. When a joint changes position, such as an elbow straightening as we reach for a light switch, this causes stretch on the ligaments. When ligaments stretch, they deform these receptors, which sends information along neural pathways and up to our brain. When tendons experience tensile force, their proprioceptors do the same thing.

Together, this gives us subconscious awareness of:

1) What angle and position our joints are in

2) How much force is being sent through our muscles and tendons

The synthesis of this information by the brain is what creates proprioception.

How does proprioception relate to hypermobility?

Well, hypermobility is related to a defect in type 1 collagen, which makes all connective tissue in the body stretchier and less elastic than normal. And guess what contains connective tissue? You got it, tendons and ligaments. As a result, these tissues stretch more than normal, and provide less resistance to stretch.

Think about a very stiff elastic like a bungie-cord (high elasticity), versus the worn-out waistband in an old pair of boxer briefs (low elasticity). Even a small amount of stretch through the bungie will yield a large increase in tension. However, the old waistband will experience less tension despite an equal increase in stretch.

Hypermobile tissues (ligaments, tendons, etc.) are like the old waistband, and it takes more stretch to send an equivalent amount of proprioceptive information to the brain, compared to a stiffer tissue.

So hypermobile individuals, on a baseline level, have compromised proprioception. This can explain why you might feel clumsy or slower to learn new movement skills. However, it’s not all doom and gloom! The good news is the nervous system is highly adaptable, and anything that is practised can be improved! Just like learning piano or studying a new language, working on your proprioception will create new and more efficient synaptic pathways in your brain, improving your skill. That’s why working on proprioception, or movement awareness, is just as important for hypermobile individuals as working on strength.

So how do we develop proprioception? That’s a big topic, best fit for another blog post. If you’d like to dive in, the Stable Foundations training program contains a multitude of proprioception-focused exercises so you can start doing just that!

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