Psychologists' Practices Compared to the Expectations of Family Law Judges and Attorneys in Child Custody Cases

Abstract

Three recent studies have explored the practices of psychologists (Ackerman & Ackerman, 1997), family law judges' expectations (Ackerman & Steffen, 2001), and family law attorneys' expectations (Ackerman & Kelley-Poulos, 2001) in child custody cases. This study compares psychologists' practices with judges' and attorneys' expectations as previously reported in the above studies. Similarities and differences among the groups are analyzed and discussed. Psychologists, judges, and attorneys are more alike than different in their practices, with notable exceptions reported. Implications for interpretation and recommendations in child custody cases are discussed.     

Countertransference Bias in Child Custody Evaluations Is Just a Horse of a Different Color: A Rejoinder to Martindale and Gould

ABSTRACT

The authors' reply to Martindale and Gould's critique of Pickar's article (2007a, this issue), “Countertransference Bias in the Child Custody Evaluator.” Martindale and Gould's objections to considering an evaluator's countertransference reactions as a potential source of bias are addressed by focusing on these four areas: (1) Whether it is useful to introduce the term “countertransference bias” to identify a potential source of distortion in custody evaluations; (2) How the empirical literature on countertransference in the context of psychotherapy might apply to the child custody evaluation process; (3) Clarification of areas of agreement and disagreement with Martindale and Gould, and (4) The importance of evaluator attempts at “debiasing.” We conclude that gaining awareness of countertransference reactions can only enhance the evaluator's ability to provide the most objective custody evaluation possible.     

Experiences of Custody Evaluation: Perspectives of Young Adults Who Were the Subject of Family Court Proceedings as Children

ABSTRACT

Court-ordered custody evaluations are conducted primarily to assist courts in making decisions regarding the best interests of children in the context of parental disputes over custody and access. They also represent the most common means through which children's wishes in relation to custody and access are presented as evidence. This article reports on a qualitative research study of young adults' recollections of participating in custody evaluations ordered by the Family Court of Australia. In-depth interviews were conducted with 18 young adults, aged 18 to 26. Two major areas of inquiry are addressed in this article: (1) participants' recollections of interviews conducted by social workers and psychologists for the purpose of custody evaluation, and (2) their suggestions for ways in which professionals working with children in this context might make the process easier for children. Taken together, their experiences point to some useful principles for practice in this field.     

Critiquing a Colleague's Forensic Advisory Report

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to provide a protocol within which to frame a critique or critical review of a colleague's custody evaluation. While we think that the structure and logic of the following protocol may be applied to other forensic evaluations, our focus here is on the specific forensic specialty area of child custody and parenting access evaluations (CCEs).     

Evaluating Allegations of Child Sexual Abuse Within Complex Child Custody Cases

SUMMARY

This article provides a framework for identifying and assembling the interdependent elements of a child custody evaluation with allegations of child sexual abuse. The identification of several myths regarding child sexual abuse (CSA) introduces the subject matter of this article. A forensic evaluation model (Heilbrun, 2001) is then used to organize the custody evaluator's tasks into the following sequential classifications: (a) preparation; (b) data collection; (c) data interpretation; and (d) communication of results. Through this model, the entwined tasks of evaluating the child's needs and the parents' capacities to meet the child's needs, while simultaneously examining the question of child sexual abuse, are addressed.     

Evaluating the Probative Value of Child Custody Evaluations

Abstract

The ultimate purpose of a child custody evaluation is to assist children and their families to restructure their family lives after divorce. A competent forensic work product is defined, in part, by the eval-uator'S use of current state of the art forensic methods and procedures applied to child custody evaluations (Gould, 1998). In this paper, a detailed structure for reviewing the reliability and relevance of a child custody advisory report is provided in order to help these professionals produce a work product of greater weight and sufficiency to the court and a work product that is increasingly useful to the families we seek to help.     

Exploring Three Functions in Child Custody Evaluation for the Relocation Case: Prediction,Investigation, and Making Recommendations for a Long-Distance Parenting Plan

SUMMARY

The psycho-legal dilemmas posed by child custody relocation cases are discussed in terms of the four decisional alternatives facing the court and evaluator. Different legal contexts for relocation are reviewed in terms of their implications for the custody evaluation. Complexities involved in the evaluator's function of making predictions for the court are presented. The need to conduct careful investigation on both risk and pragmatic factors is highlighted by case illustrations. The obstacles of crafting of long distance parenting plans that will be in the best interests of the child are presented as governed by the goal of harm mitigation.     

Child Custody Evaluations in Cases Involving Sexual Abuse: A View from the Bench

SUMMARY

Psychological evaluation and testimony play a critical role in child sexual abuse cases, especially in custody and visitation cases. While the evaluation generally cannot determine whether sexual abuse has occurred, it can provide useful information to assist the court in deciding matters of custody and access in the face of the allegations. Judges need to know the standard of practice for the development of expert opinion in order to be able to evaluate testimony offered by custody evaluators. The informed judge can develop useful input by outlining expectations within the order for evaluation and actively regulating the gate for admission of expert testimony. Elements of a model order for custody evaluations addressing allegations of sexual abuse are proposed.     

Ethical Issues in Child Custody and Dependency Cases

Abstract

The emotional and psychological risks to children of high conflict divorce have led to the increased involvement of mental health professionals in child custody cases. Numerous service models (Greenberg & Gould, 2001; Johnston, 2000; Johnston & Roseby, 1997) have been developed to assist divorcing families in minimizing family conflict and supporting children'S needs. This underscores the need for judges and attorneys to understand the ethical and professional standards that underlie competent mental health practice in forensic cases. The practices of mental health professionals providing court-related services may have a substantial impact on the validity of their professional opinions, the effectiveness of services provided to children and families, and children'S development and adjustment. The authors suggest core ethical and clinical issues to be considered by all psychologists who work in the context of custody disputes. It is hoped that these professional practice suggestions will also be useful to attorneys and judicial officers in assessing the quality of mental health professionals' opinions.     

Young Children's Problematic Sexual Behaviors,Unsubstantiated Allegations of Child Sexual Abuse,and Family Boundaries in Child Custody Disputes

ABSTRACT

Allegations of child sexual abuse are sometimes alleged based on a child's problematic sexual behaviors. When the allegations are unsubstantiated, child custody evaluators are asked to make recommendations regarding custody. Historically, it has been believed that if a child engages in problematic sexual behaviors it is strong evidence of child sexual abuse. Recent research finds that there are many reasons, other than overt sexual abuse, for children to engage in problematic sexual behaviors. This article outlines these reasons and provides a methodology for the evaluation of the boundaries in both parents' homes to assist in determining the possible etiology of the problematic sexual behaviors of the child. Suggestions are made regarding visitation and reunification if boundary concerns are found.     

Countertransference Bias in the Child Custody Evaluator

ABSTRACT

Concerns about bias which may arise in the child custody evaluation process have recently attracted critical attention. The types of biases addressed are those that primarily stem from cognitive psychology, as well as social and cultural sources of bias. Rarely discussed, however, is bias which can stem from evaluator countertransference, which if unrecognized can potentially lead to biased and non-objective recommendations. While one must strive to be objective and impartial, child custody evaluators are frequently working with highly charged emotional issues which may interact with their own personal issues or past experiences. This article examines the types of counter-transference phenomenon which may arise in the child custody evaluation, and presents tips for identifying and managing such reactions.     

Introduction to the Volume on Psychological Testing in Child Custody Evaluations

ABSTRACT

Allegations of domestic violence are among the most difficult to assess when they are posed during a child custody evaluation. We discuss the social and political context within which such evaluations occur. We describe both historical and current conceptualizations of and research concerning domestic violence. We end by discussing a variety of factors evaluators may consider using when developing an evaluation protocol to assess allegations of domestic violence within the context of child custody disputes.     

Custody Recommendations of Israeli Social Workers

Abstract

This study examines the custody recommendations of a sample of Israeli social workers who advise the courts. It looks at their recommendations in relation to the child's wishes and the workers' assessments of the children's expected quality of life with each of the parents. The findings show that the social workers based their recommendations mainly on the child's preference where that was clear, and, where it was not, on the child's expected quality of life with the two parents. With this, maternal custody remained the default recommendation and paternal custody was recommended only when the quality of life the father was expected to enable was significantly higher than that the mother was expected to enable.     

Abusers gaining custody in family courts: A case series of over turned decisions

Abstract

This article presents findings and recommendations based on an in-depth examination of records from 27 custody cases from across the United States. The goal of this case series was to determine why family courts may place children with a parent that the child alleges abused them rather than with the nonoffending parent. We focused on “turned around cases” involving allegations of child abuse that were at first viewed as false and later judged to be valid. The average time a child spent in the court ordered custody of an abusive parent was 3.2?years. In all cases we uncovered the father was the abusive parent and the mother sought to protect their child. Results revealed that initially courts were highly suspicious of mothers' motives for being concerned with abuse. These mothers were often treated poorly and two-thirds of the mothers were pathologized by the court for advocating for the safety of their children. Judges who initially ordered children into custody or visitation with abusive parents relied mainly on reports by custody evaluators and guardians ad litem who mistakenly accused mothers of attempting to alienate their children from the father or having coached the child to falsely report abuse. As a result, 59% of perpetrators were given sole custody and the rest were given joint custody or unsupervised visitation. After failing to be protected in the first custody determination, 88% of children reported new incidents of abuse. The abuse often became increasingly severe and the children's mental and physical health frequently deteriorated. The main reason that cases turned around was because protective parents were able to present compelling evidence of the abuse and back the evidence up with reports by mental health professionals who had specific expertise in child abuse rather than merely custody assessment.     

Safety First

Abstract

A substantial percentage of contested child custody cases involve allegations of domestic violence. The impact on the psychological health and physical safety of the child exposed to domestic violence has only recently become a focus of the courts' and child custody evalu-ators' attention. Currently, the majority of state statutes include consideration of domestic violence in “best interests” child custody criteria. However, many of the statues do not provide the child custody evaluator the specific criteria to consider, especially if the domestic violence allegations have not been previously reported to authorities prior to the commencement of separation and divorce proceedings. This article presents the first three steps of the six-step Safety First Model, designed to assist the legal and psychological professions to focus on the priorities on the safety of children exposed to domestic violence.     

What the Rorschach Can Contribute to Child Custody and Parenting Time Evaluations

SUMMARY

Personality assessment can indirectly help custody evalu-ators answer important questions about parental competence and the fit between parents' psychological resources and children's needs. It is preferable to use testing to check hypotheses derived from the case information rather than the reverse. The Rorschach makes it possible to assess implicit motives, coping capacities, and need states, thus complementing and supplementing self-attributed personal characteristics from the MMPI-2 and other self-report data. It also offers idiographic information for individualizing assessments. Concerns about admissibility and charges that the Rorschach “overpathologizes” litigants are addressed, and suggestions are offered for making optimal use of the Rorschach in child custody work.     

A Floor,Not a Ceiling

Abstract

With the identification of twenty-six standards, this article argues that the child custody evaluation field has defined a set of minimum practice standards that go beyond the aspirational goals of existing “guidelines” and “parameters.7rdquo; These twenty-six standards constitute a floor, but not a ceiling, for conducting child custody evaluations (CCEs).     

A Critical Analysis of Parental Alienation Syndrome and Its Admissibility in the Family Court

Abstract

Over the past three decades, parental alienation syndrome (PAS) has been proposed to explain behaviors by a child who refuses to spend time with a parent and actually denigrates that parent within the context of a child custody dispute. Although some mental health professionals and child custody evaluators, attorneys, and judges have been quick to accept and admit PAS as evidence in these disputes, there has been no consistent empirical or clinical evidence that PAS exists or that the alienator's behavior is the actual cause of the alienated child's behavior towards the target parent. This article attempts to help those working with custody issues understand how the PAS construct fails to meet scientific standards and should not be admissible in courts.     

The Forensic Model

Abstract

Understanding the relationship between psychological ethics and scientifically informed methodology is critical to a competently crafted child custody advisory report. This paper offers a working definition of the forensic model and integrates elements of the 2002 American Psychological Association's Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct(American Psychological Association, 2002) with forensic methods and procedures as applied to child custody evaluations.     

Roots of Futility,by Norman A. Polansky,Robert D. Borgman,and Christine De Saix. Jossey-Bass,San Francisco, 1972. $9.50 Hardbound. 288 Pages

Abstract

This paper describes a study of first year graduate social work students' work in practica and assesses their transfer of practice evaluation knowledge and skills from the classroom to the field. The data are drawn from case material recorded by the students using a structured recording format. The paper addresses three central questions. What were the salient features of the students' practices? Did students apply practice evaluation knowledge to their work with clients? And, what variables influenced the ways that the students practiced? Recommendations for enhancing class and field integration and for increasing knowledge and skill transfer given the significant influence of the practicum instructor's orientation are discussed.