As the rate of divorce is increasing, the number of children who have to cope with these stressful situations is also growing. Since these divorces come with many problems for the children involved, they are getting more and more attention. The professionnals who are required by the court to give their opinion on who should get the custody or what will be the right of access, have pointed out a particular phenomenon: parental alienation syndrome. The first person who described this syndrome was Gardner (1989, 1992a). He blamed the court system for the syndrome, where, in its adversarial perspective, one side tries to win over the other using alienation as one of their strategies. In our opinion, this view does not account for all the aspects of the parental alienation syndrome and for the emotional turmoil created by the divorce. When, after a divorce, one is trapped in one's emotions, the result is an impass, where parental alienation is but one aspect of this impass. This paper shows how an impass, grows and which form the parental alienation syndrome takes. Cases from our practice will illustrate some situations of parental alienation resulting from a psychological impass and where the children are the victims.

No description available.

Gu Minmin. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2006. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 103-113). / Abstracts in English and Chinese; appendices also in Chinese. / Chapter CHAPTER ONE: --- INTRODUCTION --- p.1 / Divorce in China --- p.3 / "Children's adjustment to divorce in the Mainland, China" --- p.5 / Research questions --- p.6 / Organization of the thesis --- p.7 / Chapter CHAPTER TWO: --- LITERATURE REVIEW --- p.8 / Research on children's divorce adjustment in China --- p.8 / Research on children's divorce adjustment in the West --- p.13 / Resilience perspective in children's divorce adjustment --- p.16 / Summary --- p.30 / Chapter CHAPTER THREE: --- CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK --- p.31 / Resilience perspective as the guiding perspective --- p.31 / Children's divorce adjustment as conceptualized by resilience perspective --- p.31 / Relevant issues --- p.33 / Summary --- p.35 / Chapter CHAPTER FOUR: --- METHODOLOGY --- p.37 / Qualitative approach --- p.37 / Sample --- p.38 / Data collection --- p.43 / Data analysis --- p.45 / Procedures to ensure credibility of the research --- p.46 / Ethical issues in the research --- p.48 / Chapter CHAPTER FIVE: --- THE SEVEN LIFE STORIES --- p.49 / Xiao Jun --- p.49 / Xiao Yin --- p.52 / Xiao Fang --- p.54 / An Jing --- p.57 / Yan Yan --- p.60 / Xiao Zhong --- p.64 / Jiong Jiong --- p.68 / Chapter CHAPTER SIX: --- COMMON PROTECTIVE FACTORS AND PROTECTIVE MECHANISMS --- p.73 / Common protective factors --- p.73 / Protective mechanisms: How protective factors work with risk factors --- p.81 / Summary --- p.85 / Chapter CHAPTER SEVEN: --- DISCUSSION --- p.86 / Contextual protective factors: resources and limitations --- p.86 / Unresolved risk factor: the inadequacy of the legal system --- p.90 / Chapter CHAPTER EIGHT: --- RECOMMNEDATIONS --- p.92 / Recommendations and interventions at ideological level --- p.92 / Recommendations and interventions at a structural and policy level --- p.95 / Recommendations and interventions at individual and family levels --- p.98 / Recommendations at the research level --- p.100 / REFERENCES --- p.103 / APPENDICES --- p.114

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Virginia Commonwealth University, 2007. / Prepared for: Dept. of Psychology. Bibliography: leaves 107-116. Also available online.

Dissertation (Ph.D.) -- The Institute for Clinical Social Work, 2006. / A dissertation submitted to the faculty of the Institute of Clinical Social Work in partial fulfillment for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy.

M.Ed. (Educational Psychology) / As an educator, psychologist, or counselor one is frequently confronted with the devastation and turmoil Divorce brings to the lives of children and how it aims at stealing their Hope and happiness. The aim in this research study was to consult children about their relationship with Divorce in order to learn about hopefulness from them when standing up to Divorce. To discover Hope in the face of Divorce, this qualitative study was conducted with children utilising participatory action research and narrative therapy. The theoretical foundation operated from, was the post-modernist paradigm and social constructionist discourse. This theoretical foundation was selected as it draws from the same philosophical markers as participatory action research and narrative therapy. The children who participated in this research study were two girls that I conversed with in therapy as part of my internship at a private practice. The two young girls I conversed with, both referred themselves for therapeutic conversations as they were being confronted by Divorce in their families. They are respectively ten and eleven years of age. These two girls participated after the finalisation of the divorce proceedings in their families. In this study, I drew on multiple methods of data collection during the research process in order to construct and generate rich data with the participants. The data included therapeutic conversations, artworks, journal texts and whatever else the children brought to our conversations. The recording of the children's experiences (data) was done by gathering and reflecting thick descriptions. These thick descriptions reflected their Hope and enriched my understanding of Hope.

Parental divorce is considered one of the most stressful events in the lives of children. The adult perspective has dominated the discourse on divorce, and only recently has research started to consider the viewpoint of children. Research indicates that the nature of the divorce process as experienced by the child is the most important factor in post-divorce adjustment. It also remains a relatively unexplored area, with research on the manner in which children experience the divorce process being limited. The current study aimed to conduct a narrative inquiry into the experiences and perceptions of parental divorce, of a purposive sample of 9 to 10 year old children. The primary aim of the study was to highlight and honour the voice of the child in a parental divorce process. The current research was qualitative in nature and adopted a narrative paradigm. Five children were interviewed qualitatively using an unstructured interview. Data were analysed using thematic analysis. Seven themes were identified. The first theme explored children’s endeavours to describe and explain parental divorce. An additional six themes were developed around the types of stories children told of the divorce process. Themes included, What is a Divorcement, Stories of Loss, Stories of Gain, Stories of Change, Stories of Stability, Healing Stories, and Complicating Stories. This study endeavoured to provide divorced parents and those working with children a greater understanding of the way in which children perceive parental divorce, and insight into the factors that facilitate children’s positive adjustment to parental divorce.

Thesis--PlanB (M.S.)--University of Wisconsin--Stout, 2002. / Includes bibliographical references.

published_or_final_version / abstract / toc / Clinical Psychology / Master / Master of Social Sciences

Adaptive processes were comparatively examined in elementary school children experiencing the postdivorce process and their peers from intact homes using a developmental conceptualization of coping with a family systems perspective. Children's psycho-social coping resources were assessed using the Self Perception Profile for Children, Coping Inventory, Children's Beliefs About Parental Divorce Scale, and Family Environment Scale. Children's global and specific coping efforts were measured using the Child Behavior Checklist and the Schoolagers' Coping Strategies Inventory, respectively. Parental coping efforts were examined using the Ways of Coping Questionnaire. Children from disrupted families were found to have diminished psycho-social coping resources (self-efficacy, self-esteem, coping styles, and social support). Between group differences were found in children's global coping efforts with the frequency and effectiveness of specific coping efforts being influenced by the time since marital disruption. Relationships between children's coping resources and efforts were also observed. In disrupted family systems, parental coping efforts characterized by escape-avoidant and social support seeking behaviors were found to be associated with children's global coping efforts.