This article provides an overview of the key concepts, themes, issues, and possible mental health and legal interventions related to children's postseparation resistance to having contact with one parent. We maintain that the too often strongly gendered polemic on alienation and abuse is polarizing and needs to be replaced with a more nuanced and balanced discussion that recognizes the complexity of the issues so that the needs of children and families can be better met. This article reviews the historical development of the concept of alienation; discusses the causes, dynamics, and differentiation of various types of parent child contact problems; and summarizes the literature on the impact of alienation on children. These are complex cases. A significant portion of the cases in which alienation is alleged are not in fact alienation cases; for those where alienation is present, interventions will vary depending on the degree of the alienation. More severe alienation cases are unlikely to be responsive to therapeutic or psycho-educational interventions in the absence of either a temporary interruption of contact between the child and the alienating parent or a more permanent custody reversal. We conclude with a summary of recommendations for practice and policy, including the need for early identification and intervention to prevent the development of severe cases, interdisciplinary collaboration and further development and research of interventions.f cre_1287 10..47

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The objective of this study was to examine defensive underreporting on the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory-2 (MMPI-2) with a sample of parents involved in custody dispute litigation. With a composite score derived from 2 nontraditional validity indicators-the Wiggins Social Desirability scale (WSD) and the Superlative scale (5), which had previously been identified as the best predictors of fake-good responding, 74% of litigants were identified as underreporting compared with 52% identified using traditional Lie (L) and Correction (K) scale criterion. Litigants identified as underreporters, whether using either the WSD-S criterion or the L-K criterion, had clinical scale profiles that were similar to those identified as nonunderreporters. The outcome of this study suggests that the WSD and S scales are perhaps more useful in the identification of defensive underreporting than the L and K scales.In many situations, individuals undergoing psychological assessment have much to gain by altering their responses to disguise or otherwise minimize their psychopathology; this is commonly referred to as defensive or fake-good responding. Clinicians may encounter fake-good responding in a variety of settings, including personnel selection, correctional and hospital settings, and family access and child custody evaluations (Pope, Butcher, & Seelen, 1993). In a recent article outlining the legal basis for forensic applications of the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory-2 (MMPI-2; Butcher, Dahlstrom, Graham, Tellegen, & Kaemmer, 1989), Ogloff (1995 reported that the MMPI-2 was cited more frequently in custody access and parenting cases than in any other causes of action reaching the appellate level of review, including workers' compensation and employment disability, criminal responsibility, and sexual offenses. In a national survey of custody evaluation practices, Ackerman and Ackerman (1997) reported that the MMPI-2 was the most frequently used instrument in the

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