Children's Competence to Participate in Divorce Custody Decisionmaking

Garrison, Ellen

doi:10.1207/s15374424jccp2001_10

Cited by 51 publications

(14 citation statements)

References 19 publications

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“…The literature on cognitive competence and suggestibility has limited relevance to children's competence to participate in formulating parenting plans. Garrison (1991) evaluated the competence of children between 9 and 14 years old to state a reasonable custodial preference and to articulate reasonable bases for their choice in response to two hypothetical vignettes. The children's responses were compared with those of 18‐year‐olds according to an index of reasonableness derived from judges' ratings of the two vignettes.…”

Section: Developmental Considerationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Payoffs and Pitfalls of Listening to Children

Warshak¹

2003

Family Relations

100

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Children's perspectives can enlighten decisions regarding custody and parenting plans, but different opinions exist about how best to involve children in the decision-making process. This article discusses why most procedures for soliciting children's preferences do not reliably elicit information on their best interests and do not give children a meaningful voice in decision making. Instead, these procedures provide children with forums in which to takes sides in their parents' disputes. In addition to hearing an individual child's voice, decision makers can use the collective voice of children, as revealed in research on such topics as joint custody, overnight stays, and relocation to help understand what children might say about these issues with the hindsight of maturity and in the absence of parental pressure, loyalty conflicts, inhibitions, and limitations in perspective and articulation.

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Section: Developmental Considerationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Payoffs and Pitfalls of Listening to Children

Warshak¹

2003

Family Relations

100

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“…Interestingly, Garrison (1991) empirically investigated the competency of children, ages 9-14, to state a custodial preference in a divorce dispute. She found that 14-year-olds were as competent as a control group of 18-year-olds.…”

Section: Journal Of Child Custodymentioning

confidence: 99%

Review of Empirical Research on Child Custody Practice

Bow

2006

Journal of Child Custody

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This article reviews the current state of child custody practice and its significant changes over the past 20 years. Three types of research methodology are reviewed regarding child custody practice: survey research with child custody evaluators, survey research with judges and attorneys, and content analysis of child custody reports. The assessment of specialized issues in child custody evaluations, such as sexual abuse and domestic violence, are addressed as well. Factors promoting change in child custody practice over the years are discussed, along with areas needing further improvement and research.

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“…Second, decisions about custody are complex and need to be based on the weight of many factors such as parenting capacity and availability, the child's current as well as future physical and psychological needs, environmental factors and the quality of the relationships between the child and prospective custodians (Sattler, 1998). Although children at least 9 years of age can demonstrate the potential ability to consider such factors when making decisions about custodial preference (see Garrison, 1991), children's limited linguistic, cognitive and social/emotional development make it difficult for them to know and to articulate what is in their best interests and to have a realistic understanding of the immediate and long-term consequences of their preferences. Reasons offered by children for their choices provide useful insight into their capacity to make a judgement, and the degree to which their statements are fuelled by sympathy, anger, disillusionment or duress (see Oberlander, 1995).…”

Section: Table 1 Common Misunderstandings In Forensic Interviews Invomentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In conclusion, because the dynamics of cases varies considerably, the extent and nature of the child's involvement and the weight that is placed on the child's custodial preference (if provided) needs to be determined on a caseby-case basis. Unless custodial preference is readily articulated, however, children should not be pressured into making a choice (Garrison, 1991). If a choice is made, the child's apparent preferences need to be considered as only one part of the entire situation and should be treated with a certain degree of caution (Maloney, 1995;Renouf, 1990).…”

Section: Table 1 Common Misunderstandings In Forensic Interviews Invomentioning

confidence: 99%

Guidelines for interviewing children during child custody evaluations

Powell

Lancaster

2003

Australian Psychologist

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This paper offers a brief review of the current literaturerelated to the interviewing of children during child custody evaluations. In particular, the paper highlights several key issues and concerns, and provides a series of recommendations for professionals working in this area. These recommendations (which apply to children aged 3 to 12 years) are organised under the following headings: (a) establish rapport using broad open-ended questions, (b) make the purpose and ground rules of the interview clear to the child, (c) allow the child's perspective be heard without expecting an outright custody preference, (d) demonstrate a willingness to consider all reasonable perspectives or hypotheses about what has occurred, (e) try not to exacerbate the child's stress or guilt, (f) pursue all possible explanations for a child's report, irrespective of whether there are clear signs of "coaching" or contamination, (g) obtain appropriate training in the use of forensic interviewing techniques, and (h) engage in research on the impact of children's participation in custody cases.

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Children's Competence to Participate in Divorce Custody Decisionmaking

Cited by 51 publications

References 19 publications

Payoffs and Pitfalls of Listening to Children

Payoffs and Pitfalls of Listening to Children

Review of Empirical Research on Child Custody Practice

Guidelines for interviewing children during child custody evaluations

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