The basic techniques of small-joint manipulation involve grabbing and bending back one or more fingers/toes and by applying pressure to the wrist/ankle joints that disrupt the interconnectivity of the system of smaller joints within.

If pain compliance does not work, such hyperextension can tear tendons in the wrist or break the smaller bones in the hands and feet.

The leverage needed for such joint manipulation is comparatively small and creates a distinct advantage over techniques in martial arts that require the exertion of large amounts of force, thus small joint manipulation can allow a weaker person, with the right training, to control a stronger one.

Although, wrist locks are also severely limited in most of these sports because of rules forbidding grabbing handguards or hands, forbidding the use of pressure points, and the protections provided from the handguards and taping of the wrists.

Small Joint Locks are, however, taught as a self-defense and pain compliance technique, for instance in hapkido, Chin Na, jujutsu, Krav Maga, and aikido, [1]'.