Parental Alienation Tips
What is Parental Alienation?
Parental Alienation occurs when a parent poisons a child's mind against the other parent, and also gets the child to join in the attack on the targeted parent. In divorce or in never-married situations, a parent will often criticize the other parent, but that criticism seldom rises to the point that the child becomes alienated from the targeted parent.
When that point is reached, it is, in my view, a form of child abuse. It is child abuse because half the child comes from the other parent, and the alienator is saying in effect, "Half of my child is no good, half of my child comes from a terrible person, half of my child is conflicted." The alienator, however, is rarely thinking of the child's best interest, but only of herself, or himself.
Dr. Richard Gardner, the former Columbia University professor and noted author of more than 30 books, coined the phrase Parental Alienation Syndrome. He described its common factors, which makes it a psychologically recognizable condition. Its common factors consist of the child seeing things in black and white, the child being unable to remember any happy times with the targeted parent even when shown photos of such pleasant events, the child including all of the disfavored parent's relatives in the scheme to abuse him or her, and parroting allegations of abuse in the same phraseology as the favored parent.
Whether or not parental alienation is a syndrome, however, it is gender-neutral. That is, either a father or mother may alienate the child against the other parent. At a conference some years ago, Dr. Gardner asked the audience why fathers were increasingly becoming alienators. I replied that is it was because fathers were gaining custody more often. Dr. Gardner replied that this was a reasonable answer.
Since Dr. Gardner's death – and even before – other noted psychologists have carried forth the campaign against parental alienation. They include Dr. Amy Baker of New York City, Dr. Richard Warshak of Texas, Dr. Richard Sauber of Boca Raton, FL,editor of The American Journal of Family Therapy, and Bill Bernet, MD. who has been working to obtain recognition of Parental Alienation by the American Psychiatric Association, in the DSM V, which will list various psychiatric disorders.
Parental alienation is recognized by many courts, and it generally takes a psychologist to speak as an expert in trial about the matter. However, I am also an expert in this area, and I can work informally with parents, educate them, and advise them on a strategy for dealing with this problem. This is an outrageous condition affecting the well-being of children, and must be skillfully opposed by the scorned parent, even though it can cost a lot of money to do so. I can recommend the best psychologists and attorneys to deal with the problem, without bankrupting the targeted parent.
The second revision of the International Handbook to PAS will be published in 2012, edited by Lorandos, Bernet and Sauber. David Levy has a chapter in this book describing parental alienation as a form of child abuse. Also, Sauber, a forensic psychologist, is writing a book with Amy Baker and Katherine Andre on clinical approaches to treating PAS tentatively entitled Working with Alienated Children and Families: A Clinical Guidebook.