Medical–Legal and Psychosocial Considerations on Parental Alienation as a Form of Child Abuse: A Brief Review

Abstract

Parental alienation, an entity situated at the limit of psychiatry, sociology, and justice, still represents a controversial concept despite the legal dispositions that take it into account. The scope of this paper is to consider the relationship between parent and child, and child abuse from a psychosocial perspective, as well as to depict parental alienation, considered a form of child abuse, without omitting contradictory arguments which are also based on prudence in the minor’s interest, turning the attention to parental estrangement. Although parental alienation is not a psychiatric diagnosis per se and neither is parental estrangement, recognizing the difference between them is vital to adequately manage the situation at the time of establishing custody.

“I Was Told When I Could Hold, Talk With, or Kiss Our Daughter”: Exploring Fathers’ Experiences of Parental Alienation Within the Context of Intimate Partner Violence

“…Both speak to literature highlighting the profound impact alienating behaviours have on the children involved and the significantly increased lifetime risks of both mental and physical illness for the children involved (Baker, 2005;Baker & Verrocchio, 2013;Marques et al, 2020;Verrocchio et al, 2018), and which highlight the link between alienation and a wide variety of behavioural, emotional and cognitive impairments (Cummings & Davies, 2010;Harman et al, 2018;Harman et al, 2022;Johnston et al, 2005;Seijo et al, 2016). Indeed, there is substantial debate as to whether alienating behaviours constitute a form of child abuse (Harman et al, 2018;Isailă & Hostiuc, 2022;Kruk, 2018), to which this study provides an important contribution (though further research on the impact of PA on children is needed).…”

“…Specifically, PA is argued to be a distinctive and complex form of violence (Clawar & Rivlin, 2013;Harman, Bernet, et al, 2019;Harman et al, 2018) that occurs frequently in association with family separation or divorce (Baker & Verrocchio, 2015;Harman, Leder-Elder, et al, 2016), though it should be noted that this too is still disputed (Mercer, 2021(Mercer, , 2022. Some have gone further, arguing that, due to the damage these behaviours have on the children involved, that parental alienation could and/or should be classified as a form of child abuse (Isailă & Hostiuc, 2022;von Boch-Galhau, 2018). A substantial body of work now exists (see Harman et al, 2022;Hine, in press;and Marques et al, 2020 for reviews) cataloguing the types of behaviours utilised to enact PA (Baker & Darnall, 2006;Harman et al, 2018;Harman & Matthewson, 2020;Verrocchio et al, 2018), how to measure PA (Bernet & Greenhill, 2022), and its impact on both children (Baker, 2005;Baker & Verrocchio, 2013;Verrocchio et al, 2018) and mothers and fathers as the alienated parent (Baker, 2010;Baker & Verrocchio, 2015Balmer et al, 2018;Dijkstra, 2019;Kruk, 2015;Lee-Maturana et al, 2020Lee-Maturana et al, 2019;Poustie et al, 2018;Tavares et al, 2020Tavares et al, , 2021Taylor-Potter, 2015;Torun et al, 2022).…”