Vestibular reflexes
The vestibulo-ocular reflex stabilizes our vision during head movement. When head rotation is detected, this reflex is triggered, keeping our eyes in the center of the visual field through a compensatory movement towards the opposite side where our head is displaced. It indicates the significant link between our vision and balance, involving coordinated engagements of the vestibular, visual, and cervical systems. It is an essential reflex while skiing since our head is constantly turning to detect environmental visual information.
The optokinetic reflex also aims to stabilize our gaze by combining saccadic and smooth pursuit movements. This reflex is activated when, for example, we visually follow a skier in motion (smooth pursuit) and at a certain point we make a saccadic movement towards another one.
The vestibulocollic reflex takes action in our neck muscles to stabilize head rotations.
The vestibulospinal reflex is intended to stabilize our body, participating in the maintenance of an upright posture. When tilting our head to one side, our spinal cord produces an extension on that same side and a flexor activity of the opposite (one side pushes and the other pulls). When our head is tilted backward, our body extensor tone increases, and decreases when it is tilted downwards. Thanks to this reflex, one side of our body is active for pushing and the other for pulling, helping balance maintenance.
The vestibulo-emotional reflex is a head movement reflex tending to stabilize it through our neck muscles’ activation, in a direct relationship with our psychological state. If we are calm, our head will move smoothly but if we are stressed, it will move quicker and at a greater frequency. As head vertical conservation is essential for balance maintenance, this reflex is constantly active since it affects our sense of balance.
Crossed extensor reflex
In the crossed extensor reflex, stimuli coming from one limb alter the state of the opposite limb. In this case, bending one leg facilitates the extension of the opposite, which is essential for walking, running, biking or skiing.
Vibration tonic reflex
Vibration tonic reflex is our muscles’ response to a vibratory stimulus, producing a contraction due to muscle receptors activation which react by lengthening.
Orienting reflex
The orienting reflex, or search reflex, is our response to a change or to a novelty in the environment, being useful when immediate action is required. If change is sudden then the startle reflex activates, and when novelty transforms gradually into something familiar, the habituation phenomenon is produced.
The orienting reflex is triggered because of new stimuli. Our reactions to novelty or to something different make our eyes, head, trunk or other body parts to move from one side to the other or remain still in a particular posture, orienting our head and vision towards the stimulus. It applies only to new stimuli and when these are recurrent, this reflex becomes weaker. It causes our attention attracted to novel environmental references, producing a change of our consciousness at detecting slope’s unfamiliar features.
Self-preservation reflexes
Self-preservation is the first law of nature resulting in rejecting dangerous situations. There are two types: physical self-preservation reflex (getting our hand away from a source of heat) and the psychological self-preservation reflex (braking before a potential danger because we are conscious about getting hurt or injuring others). Keeping hands and forearms lifted-up when skiing may be a habit for some skiers, but a righting reflex consequence or a self-preservation reflex for others.
The protective reflex occurs when our balance recovery is not enough. Before falling, we tend to place our hands to protect ourselves from the fall. When balance is lost and falling begins, extending our arms towards the ground is a way to protect ourselves from the impact.
The defense reflex is an involuntary action that allows moving away from a stimulus considered by us as harmful, e.g., getting away from the downhill side of a slope.
The alarm reflex is a defense response against a potential danger or a threat. It serves to protect the vulnerable parts of our body such as our neck or eyes. Our body responds with a succession of actions that begin by tightening our jaw, blinking, and tensing our neck, head, shoulders, arms, and finally our legs.
In the alarm reflex, there are two phases: first, we extend our arms, neck, and back. Eyebrows are raised and a sudden breath is made with an open mouth. This phase lasts a fraction of a second. Almost immediately, in the second phase, our feet are tensed, fists are closing tight to the poles, the body shortens, the chin gets close to our throat, stomach muscles contract, the nape contracts, the jaw closes, our face assumes a searching expression but without the usual mobility to scan the environment, and because of all of this, it will be hard for us to move since the rest of our muscles will increase tension.
If we are always skiing with this reflex activated, all of our body will begin to hurt, contractions will appear in our feet soles, and our jaw will hurt while keeping tight teeth. Then the alarm reflex transforms into a posture of fear and a painful reaction to the environment or to the particular situation. This reflex should only activate in specific skiing situations, certainly not always because chronic fatigue appears, and we will reach a stressful hyper vigilance state.
The fear-paralysis reflex in some skiers is permanently active. Its features are: being constantly on alert, evading the involvement in new activities, or being afraid and complaining about people approaching too close that may potentially hit him. There are also the following features: exaggerated anxiety, low adaptability, aversion to sliding, resistance to change, worry to feel shame, insecurity and negativity, motor paralysis under stress, and, in some cases, they are not even comfortable with winter clothes or reject ski boots. Whoever experiences this reflex is in permanent stress, which could be even difficult to correctly vocalize.
The opposition to change reflexis our natural behavior opposing to do something in specific situations. For instance, when we start skiing, we tend to oppose to sliding and to slope inclination. Opposition reflex is an instinctive and defensive behavior; a survival strategy.
