Thanks for making us aware of your new articles. I'd like to respond to
your article on "Parental Alienation Syndrome". I worry that your article
serves to entrench some concepts and ideas that are highly problematic.
While I hope that in Collaborative cases concerns about one parent working
to actually "alienate" children from the other parent does not take place,
many of us who are Collaborative professionals encounter these cases in
other areas of our professional work.
The article states that "the use of that phrase (parental alienation
syndrome) remains a politically debated hot potato...". I'd like to point
out that the debate is NOT political. The debate is scientific and
conceptual and the conceptual debate is important. The construct of
parental alienation as a "syndrome" is rooted in the now discredited work of
Richard Gardner, M.D. who understood PAS as something that results from
psychopathology in the "alienating" parent. In their influential and
important article, Joan B. Kelly and Janet R. Johnston offer a conceptual
reformulation of the construct with the focus on the child rather than the
"alienating parent". The reference for this article is below
Joan B. Kelly, Janet R. Johnston (2001)
THE ALIENATED CHILD:A Reformulation of Parental Alienation Syndrome
Family Court Review 39 (3), 249266.
Quoting from the abstract of their article: "In this article, controversies
and problems with parental alienation syndrome are discussed. A
reformulation focusing on the alienated child is proposed, and these
children are clearly distinguished from other children who resist or refuse
contact with a parent following separation or divorce for a variety of
normal, expectable reasons, including estrangement. A systemic array of
contributing factors are described that can create and/or consolidate
alienation in children, including intense marital conflict, a humiliating
separation, parental personalities and behaviors, protracted litigation, and
professional mismanagement. These factors are understood in the context of
the child's capacities and vulnerabilities."
Clearly then, it is possible to see how children's resistance to contact
with a parent can derive from numerous sources, many of which are rooted in
family dynamics, the child's specific needs and temperament and parental
personalities.
I am particularly worried about the various programs that offer
"reunification" of children with an "alienated parent" due to the way in
which these programs themselves are rooted in a conceptually outmoded and
linear understanding of alienation. Indeed, there is no scientific data
that suggest that such reunification programs are successful, that they
don't in and of themselves expose children to even more trauma and that they
are likely to be of assistance to the children. I worry that any mention or
discussion of these programs without clearly articulating how they are
potentially dangerous and without clearly explaining how they are rooted in
Gardner's model of alienation runs the risk of providing the reader with
information that is ultimately not in line with current thinking and
understanding of what "alienated" children experience. Truth be told, we
know precious little about how to effectively intervene with these children.
Robert A. Simon, Ph.D.
Clinical and Forensic Psychology
Collaborative Practice
www.dr-simon.com
3636 Fifth Avenue
Suite 201
San Diego, CA 92103
619.220.7680
fax: 619.220.7682
