Articles
Brain & learning · #021 · Brain Neuroplasticity and dance: the brain changes, but the word needs precision Neuroplasticity has become a popular term and sometimes an explanation for every benefit. In research it has a more specific meaning: structural or functional change associated with experience and training.
Brain & learning · #020 · Brain The dancing brain: observing, imagining and executing are not separate tasks Dance training combines perception, memory, music, space and movement. Neuroimaging studies suggest that experience modifies networks involved in action observation and simulation, although the field is still young.
Learning & technique · #019 · Learning Imagery in dance: rehearsing an image can change movement too Dancers have used metaphors, anatomical images and mental simulation for decades. Research suggests imagery can influence learning and performance, but its effect depends on the goal, content and individual.
Performance & preparation · #018 · Performance Training load: why returning from a break can be more delicate than a full season The body tends to tolerate familiar load better than abrupt increases. Dance reviews report higher injury rates in months following return periods, when repertory and volume are rising again.
Health & career · #017 · Health Returning to dance after injury: pain-free is not the same as ready Return to dance requires recovery of tissue, physical capacity, confidence and dance-specific skills. Research still lacks fully validated tools for deciding exactly when those domains are ready together.
Health & career · #016 · Health Sleep and recovery: the invisible part of training Class ends, but adaptation continues. Sleep affects attention, mood and physical recovery, while dance-specific evidence still needs to be read without overstatement.
Health & career · #015 · Health Performance anxiety: when the stage changes the task before the music starts Performing is not simply rehearsed movement repeated in public. Expectation, evaluation and unpredictability alter attention and bodily response, sometimes helping and sometimes interfering with performance.
Health & career · #014 · Health Perfectionism in dance: when high standards stop organising and start consuming Precision belongs to the language of dance. The problem begins when error stops being information and becomes a threat to identity, body image or a dancer's place in the group.
Health & career · #013 · Health Energy availability, menstrual health and bone: when aesthetics interferes with physiology Training hard with insufficient energy can affect far more than body weight. In dancers, disordered eating, menstrual disturbance and low bone density have long appeared together as signals that deserve attention.
Learning & technique · #012 · Learning When should pointe begin? The question is better than any fixed age Chronological age alone cannot tell whether a young dancer is ready for pointe. Strength, control, maturation, technique and training context matter more, while available screening tools still have important limitations.
Health & career · #011 · Health Growing while dancing: when the adolescent body changes faster than technique During growth spurts, proportions, range, strength and body perception can change within months. For young dancers, coordination and load tolerance may shift without erasing years of learning.
Health & career · #010 · Health The ballet hip: large range is neither a problem nor a guarantee of protection A dancer's hip sits between aesthetic demand, individual anatomy and repeated load. Research finds frequent symptoms and morphological findings, but imaging is not destiny.
Health & career · #009 · Health Low back pain in dance: common does not mean simple Low back pain appears frequently in dancer research, but high prevalence does not point to one cause. Genre, load, extension, rotation, history and psychosocial factors interact.
Health & career · #008 · Health Overuse injuries: the problem often starts before pain forces a stop Many dance injuries do not happen in one clear moment. They emerge from repetition, load, recovery and individual tolerance, while research still debates how those episodes should be counted.
Body & movement · #007 · Biomechanics Turnout: how much comes from the hip — and how much the body tries to complete elsewhere The visible en dehors at the floor does not come from one joint. When the desired range exceeds what the hip provides, the knee, tibia, ankle and foot can enter the negotiation.
Body & movement · #006 · Biomechanics Foot and ankle: why so much of dance converges into a few centimetres The foot must be a base, lever, shock absorber and expressive instrument. That concentration of functions helps explain why foot and ankle repeatedly appear in dance-injury research.
Body & movement · #005 · Biomechanics Pointe shoes: how much does the object change the dancing body? Toe box, shank, wear and fit change the relationship between foot and floor. Pointe-shoe research has grown, but large gaps remain between laboratory measures and real use.
Performance & preparation · #004 · Performance Fatigue in dance: when repetition stops being just repetition Fatigue does not erase technique all at once. It gradually changes how the body distributes effort, and research still finds heterogeneous answers about where those changes appear first.
Body & movement · #003 · Biomechanics Ballet jumps: take-off is power; landing is organisation Jump biomechanics show that one movement contains two different tasks: generating impulse to leave the floor and dissipating load to return to it. Technical quality depends on both.
Performance & preparation · #002 · Performance Strength in dance: why training power does not mean losing lightness Recent literature leaves less and less room for a simplistic opposition between strength and aesthetics. For dancers, the relevant question is not whether strength should be trained, but how it can be integrated without competing with technique, rehearsal volume and movement quality.
Body & movement · #001 · Biomechanics Balance in dance: what biomechanics can measure — and what technique still has to interpret Balance is not the absence of movement. For a dancer, it emerges from continuous corrections involving support, vision, proprioception, strength and artistic intention — a system science is still learning how to measure.
