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Title [Voices of Youth] How martial arts can be understood as tools to cultivate world peace? A perspective.

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  • Date
    26-11-2021
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Photo by Humphrey Muleba on Unsplash. Photo is not directly related to the writing.


Caio Amaral Gabriel

Psychotherapist with postgraduate degree in Neuropsychology

Affiliation: Judoquinhas / Kyoei Academy

canalcaiotv@gmail.com

+55 (11) 99206-0881


ABSTRACT

 

This article aims to provide a perspective to help elucidate how martial arts can be understood as tools for cultivating a more peaceful world. First, this article synthesizes studies that present evidence for the proposal that healthy childhood development, that is, the experience of a positive, stimulating and harmonious childhood, can form the basis for children to engage in peace-promoting behaviors—and that interventions during childhood can contribute to peacebuilding and peacemaking by supporting children's socio-emotional and physical development and the well-being of their families and communities. Then, this article connects several insights to propose that (1) martial arts programs that carry out actions in favor of sustainability have the potential to be bottom-up interventions to optimize the development of peaceful children; (2) the characteristics that constitute a peaceful child are the result of neural integration; (3) martial arts can contribute to a more integrated connectome, the basis of the characteristics that constitute a peaceful child that will act as an agent of change in the world. Finally, this article ends by pointing out a literary review that seeks to demonstrate considerable evidence for the proposal that intrapersonal peace—which may be the result of practicing martial arts—can be the basis of interpersonal peace and vice versa; and that interpersonally peaceful people tend to have more peaceful attitudes about international relations.

 

 

Keywords: martial arts, sustainable development goals, peace, peace psychology, peacebuilding, peacemaking, neuroscience



This article aims to provide a perspective to help elucidate how martial arts can be understood as tools for cultivating a more peaceful world. Peace is one of the Sustainable Development Goals of the 2030 Agenda (UN, 2015) and is almost universally accepted as an ideal condition for international, interpersonal and intrapersonal relationships (Sims et al., 2014). Leckman et al. (2014) point out that peace is multicomponent, being a result, a process, a human disposition and a culture. This article focuses on peace as a human disposition, recognizing the interdependence between the components.



Christie et al. (2014) provided evidence for the proposal that healthy human development during childhood can lay the foundation for children to acquire the complex and specific capabilities needed to engage in peace-promoting behaviors. In the same line of thought, Britto et al. (2014) provided evidence that the experience of a positive, stimulating, and harmonious childhood can foster peace—and that interventions during childhood have transformative power capable of cultivating conflict resolution and peace in future generations, contributing to peacebuilding (actions that promote sustainable peace by supporting the pro-social skills necessary for peace) and to peacemaking (by increasing positive reciprocal communication within families, communities and of nations) (Britto et al., 2014).



For the UN (2015), children are essential agents of change for building a sustainable world. Recent data show that there are about 1.9 billion children in the world, representing 26% of the world population (UN, 2019). In 2050, the estimate is that the number of children will be relatively the same, but representing 21% of the world population. In this context, even if the individual contributions of children were small, the number of children in the world suggests that children's role in the global advancement of sustainability could become large, provided that their rights and related programs are facilitated to and with them (von Braun, 2017).



As Britto et al. (2014) point out, globally, efforts to cultivate peace within communities and between nations tend to involve top-down approaches, through policies and national security agendas. However, evidence from the field of developmental neurobiology, as well as social and economic studies, sustains that the cultivation of peace can also be carried out from bottom-up approaches by supporting children's socio-emotional and physical development and the well-being of their families and communities.



Studies demonstrate that human beings are deeply interconnected with one another in their communities and cultures (Christakis & Fowler, 2011) and that they are able to influence individuals who are at least three degrees apart from them (Siegel, 2018). In this sense, children, if properly stimulated in actions towards sustainability, can act as agents of change and thus promote a positive impact on their families, colleagues and the entire local community (von Braun, 2017).



In this context, martial arts programs that carry out actions in favor of sustainability have the potential to be bottom-up interventions to optimize the development of "peaceful children", that is, healthy, self-regulated children who internalize values, skills and a sense of autonomy necessary to create, maintain and restore harmonious and equitable relationships (Christie et al., 2014); who are committed to social justice and human dignity; and who have the power to promote this human disposition across generations (Leckman et al., 2014).



According to the interpersonal neurobiology framework proposed by Siegel (2020), the characteristics that constitute a peaceful child are the result of neural integration, that is, of the interconnection of different parts of the nervous system. In neuroscience, the term connectome is used to describe the mapping of all connections in the nervous system of a particular species (Seung, 2012). In this sense, studies have shown that a more integrated connectome is associated with positive life traits, while a less interconnected connectome is associated with negative life traits (Smith et al., 2015); and also support the proposal of integration as the basis of health (Zhang & Raichle, 2010) and healthy self-regulation, which in neuroscience is often called executive functions (Siegel, 2018).



Indeed, Diamond (2012) stated that the most effective physical activities to cultivate executive functions are those that involve physical exercise with emotional, social and character development and mindfulness, pointing to martial arts as an example. In turn, Hackney (2013), in his neo-Aristotelian theory of the martial arts, sought to demonstrate how martial arts can be tools for cultivating virtues and character strengths. In this context, although still very scarce, some studies are beginning to demonstrate an increase in neural integration specifically of children practicing martial arts compared to control groups, as in the case of judo (Toh et al., 2018) and taekwondo (Kim et al., 2015), sustaining that martial arts can contribute to a more integrated connectome, the basis of the characteristics that constitute a peaceful child. Then, integration in relationships can also be studied (Siegel, 2018), for example, in interpersonal and international terms. In this context, Nelson (2014) carried out a literary review in which he concluded that there is considerable evidence to support the proposal that intrapersonal integration can be the basis of interpersonal integration and vice versa; and that interpersonally peaceful people tend to have more peaceful attitudes about international relations.



Finally, despite the need for more studies on the peace psychology and the psychoneurobiology of martial arts, this article proposes a potential research path that can be useful to explore how martial arts can be understood as tools to cultivate a more peaceful world.




REFERENCES

 

Britto, P. R., Gordon, I., Hodges, W., Sunar, D., Kagitcibasi, C., & Leckman, J. F. (2014). Ecology of Peace. In J. F. Leckman, C. Panter-Brick, & R. Salah (Eds.), Pathways to Peace: The Transformative Power of Children and Families (pp. 27–39). MIT Press. https://doi.org/10.7551/mitpress/9780262027984.001.0001

Christakis, N. A., & Fowler, J. H. (2011). Connected: The Amazing Power of Social Networks and How They Shape Our Lives. HarperCollins Publishers.

Christie, D. J., Panter-Brick, C., Behrman, J. R., Cochrane, J. R., Dawes, A., Goth, K., Hayden, J., Masten, A. S., Nasser, I., Punamäki, R., & Tomlinson, M. (2014). Healthy Human Development as a Path to Peace. In J. F. Leckman, C. Panter-Brick, & R. Salah (Eds.), Pathways to Peace: The Transformative Power of Children and Families (pp. 273–302). MIT Press. https://doi.org/10.7551/mitpress/9780262027984.001.0001

Diamond, A. (2012). Activities and Programs That Improve Children’s Executive Functions. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 21(5), 335–341. https://doi.org/10.1177/0963721412453722

Hackney, C. H. (2013). Martial Arts as a Pathway to Flourishing. In J. D. Sinnott (Ed.), Positive Psychology: Advances in Understanding Adult Motivation (pp. 145–158). Springer Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-7282-7_10

Kim, Y. J., Cha, E. J., Kim, S. M., Kang, K. D., & Han, D. H. (2015). The Effects of Taekwondo Training on Brain Connectivity and Body Intelligence. Psychiatry Investigation, 12(3), 335–340. https://doi.org/10.4306/pi.2015.12.3.335

Leckman, J. F., Panter-Brick, C., & Salah, R. (2014). Peace Is a Lifelong Process: The Importance of Partnerships. In J. F. Leckman, C. Panter-Brick, & R. Salah (Eds.), Pathways to Peace: The Transformative Power of Children and Families (pp. 3–17). MIT Press. https://doi.org/10.7551/mitpress/9780262027984.001.0001

Nelson, L. L. (2014). Peacefulness as a Personality Trait. In G. K. Sims, L. L. Nelson, & M. R. Puopolo (Eds.), Personal Peacefulness: Psychological Perspectives (pp. 7–43). Springer Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-9366-2_2

Seung, S. (2012). Connectome: How the Brain’s Wiring Makes Us Who We Are. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

Siegel, D. J. (2018). Mente Saudável: Uma jornada pessoal e global em busca da saúde e da conexão corpo e mente. nVersos.

Siegel, D. J. (2020). The Developing Mind: How Relationships and the Brain Interact to Shape Who We Are (3rd ed.). The Guilford Press.

Sims, G. K., Nelson, L. L., & Puopolo, M. R. (2014). Introduction to Personal Peacefulness: Psychological Perspectives. In G. K. Sims, L. L. Nelson, & M. R. Puopolo (Eds.), Personal Peacefulness: Psychological Perspectives (pp. 1–6). Springer Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-9366-2_1

Smith, S. M., Nichols, T. E., Vidaurre, D., Winkler, A. M., Behrens, T. E. J., Glasser, M. F., Ugurbil, K., Barch, D. M., van Essen, D. C., & Miller, K. L. (2015). A positive-negative mode of population covariation links brain connectivity, demographics and behavior. Nature Neuroscience, 18(11), 1565–1567. https://doi.org/10.1038/nn.4125

Toh, Z., Gu, Q., Seah, T., Wong, W., McNab, J., Chuang, K., Hong, X., & Tang, P. (2018). Increased white matter connectivity seen in young judo athletes with MRI. Clinical Radiology, 73(10), 911.e17-911.e21. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.crad.2018.06.003

United Nations. (2015). Transforming our world: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. https://www.un.org/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol=A/RES/70/1&Lang=E

United Nations. (2019). World Population Prospects 2019: Highlights. https://population.un.org/wpp/Publications/Files/WPP2019_Highlights.pdf

von Braun, J. (2017). Children as Agents of Change for Sustainable Development. In A. M. Battro, P. Léna, M. S. Sorondo, & J. von Braun (Eds.), Children and Sustainable Development: Ecological Education in a Globalized World (pp. 17–30). Springer Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-47130-3_2

Zhang, D., & Raichle, M. E. (2010). Disease and the brain’s dark energy. Nature Reviews Neurology, 6(1), 15–28. https://doi.org/10.1038/nrneurol.2009.198

 



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