Parental Alienation- How does it start?

A recent series of posts on a family law blog, along with some cutting edge fMRI research that is relevant has prompted me to do a short update on "parental alienation".

What is it?
Richard Gardner, a psychiatrist, coined the term in 1985 based on his observation of the behavior of children in divorces who were hostile toward one parent.
Gardner described PAS as a preoccupation by the child with criticism and deprecation of a parent.^[19] Gardner stated that PAS occurs when, in the context of child custody disputes, one parent deliberately or unconsciously attempts to alienate a child from the other parent. (Wikipedia; emphasis added is mine)
In my experience, both litigants and lawyers focus on the "deliberately" component, leading to a rapid escalation of conflict in the divorce and making dispute resolution and co-parenting more difficult, and lose sight of the damage to the child from the loss of a relationship with one parent.


There is ongoing controversy about whether PAS (which is a syndrome by definition) should be added to the upcoming DSM-V. In my view, PAS is not a mental disorder, won't make it into the DSM-V, and shouldn't.


What causes PAS?
In my view, after more than 30 years of dealing with divorces as a child custody evaluator, therapist, and now litigation consultant specializing in divorce litigation, PAS has multiple causes. In  order for PAS to develop, all these things must be present in the family PRIOR to divorce:


1. Personality disorders and/or bipolar/schizophrenic disorders in mom and dad or both. The personality disorders are usually of the borderline, antisocial, narcissistic, or histrionic varieties and are present long before the divorce. 


2. Black and white thinking by one or both parents (splitting-dividing the world into all good or all bad categories as a perceptual  and thinking style). This can lead to black and white thinking in the children PAST the age when it's developmentally appropriate (early elementary ages generally).


3. Vulnerability to feelings of abandonment in one or both parents.


4. Chronic inability to empathize with their spouse and their child in  one or both parents.


5. A family pattern of withdrawal of one of the parents from the tasks of parenting, and leaving that to the other spouse (usually the husband/father withdraws but sometimes it's the wife/mother). Usually this happens at the time of birth, but sometimes occurs later.


6. A pattern of overt conflict between the parents that begins long before divorce but escalates over time. This conflict includes arguments,  name calling, expressions of contempt, criticism, defensiveness, and "stonewalling" (see John Gottman and his "four horseman of the apocalypse"). The child is a witness to this conflict nearly every time it occurs and is not protected from repeated exposure to marital arguments.


7. As the marriage unravels, one parent (usually but not always, the wife/mother) forms an abnormally strong emotional bond with the child/children as the other spouse withdraws as a defense against feelings of abandonment.


8. The spouse with the now "enmeshed" relationship with the child begins to confide in the child about her dissatisfaction and complaints about the other spouse. This process may or may not be intentionally designed to further distance the father from the children, but definitely is intended to provide the adult with "allies" in the conflict, and to prevent feelings of abandonment in the adult.


9. The distant parent fails to establish, maintain, or re-establish the emotional, positive, parenting bonds with the children, and withdraws further into work or an affair or substance abuse.


In my experience with hundreds of divorce cases, I know of NO case where ALL of the factors listed above were not present when "parental alienation" was an issue. Not one.


As I noted in a recent post, new neuroscience research has revealed that merely being a spectator to an event leads to the same neural (not merely psychological) changes in the brain as being a participant. No intensive brainwashing campaign is required, merely observation. For a child, whose world is defined by their parents and families, watching one parent systematically devalue and denigrate the other "teaches" alienation. When the divorce finally occurs, the process is already completed, and the divorce litigation merely illuminates it.  


When the breakup has included a history of family violence, the odds of parental alienation are further increased, even if the child has NOT been the target of any violence. (see my last post on this blog).


When wounded people find each other and marry (and they always do find each other), and then have children before those wounds are healed and their relationship is repaired, the risk of both divorce, of PAS developing, is very high. As other professionals have noted, the children's relationship with the "alienated" can be repaired, but the process is arduous, and requires emotional and financial resources that the alienated parent doesn't always have. 


PAS is a vexing family problem, not a mental disorder, and requires a family-oriented solution that includes both parents and the child.

Mirror neurons and parental alienation

"Parental alienation" may be simpler to accomplish than you think.

Some recent leading edge research using fMRI (functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging-a scan of the brain at work) to investigate the patterns of brain activation in observers of sporting events yielded confirmation of a long held belief of neuroscientists: watching an emotionally engaging event is indistinguishable, at the brain level, from actually participating in it. Same neurons fire, same brain regions are activated, same physical sensations are registered. Or, to be more concrete, watching your favorite football team on TV activates your brain just as if you were playing the game yourself. An entire class of brain cells, called mirror neurons, has been discovered, and the their apparent function, documented many times, is to "mirror" in the brain what the senses detect in the world. Great for football fans, potentially hazardous for children living with conflict.

It has long been assumed by many family lawyers that when children exhibit behaviors indicating that they are afraid of, or angry toward, a non-custodial parent, and when those lawyers represent a parent who complains that they are the victim of a campaign of sustained "brainwashing" by the custodial parent, it must be true. How else could the little angel have become such a strangely fearful and angry child? Now we know.

Children are way more interested in the interaction of their parents than the most rabid football fan. Their very existence depends on the outcome of the conflict leading up to and through the divorce. It's safe to say that the children's mirror neurons are activated every time they witness anger, bitterness, verbal insults, and especially violence between their parents.  When one parent is suddenly absent for long periods of time (between periods of possession for the non-custodial parent, for example) and the remaining parent continues to behave in the same angry, resentful, bitter, and critical fashion toward the absent parent, the child's mirror neurons are working overtime, reproducing in the little brains the sensations and emotions that they see, hear, and feel in their crumbling, unstable divorce world.

With this crucial understanding of the underlying neural processes at work, it's easier to understand why a conscious, intentional campaign to "alienate" the child from the non-custodial parent is NOT necessary to create a fearful or angry "alienated" child. All that's required is opportunities for the child to observe the parent with possession to repeatedly talk about or act out the alienating scenario. The child's mirror neurons will do the rest.

This little piece of science also explains why experts who interview children as part of custody evaluations rarely find a "smoking gun" pattern of intentional, pre-meditated parental brainwashing. Children nearly always deny that either parent is actively programming them to dislike a parent. As this research demonstrates, it is not necessary for a parent to "program" the child--all they need to do is act out their disdain, rage, and accusations in the presence of the child. Mirror neurons in the child will do the rest.

One important difference between children of divorce and football fans: children don't have a favorite team--no matter who "wins" in this game, the kids lose, because they are rooting for both "teams".  So if those mirror neurons are firing when cheering for one favorite team, imagine how many more are firing when both of your teams are playing each other! It is this over-activation that has led to the standard instruction to divorcing parents to keep their conflict and the communication AWAY from those little eyes and the mirror neurons they are connected to in those little brains. Those little brains are not only overloaded by this lose-lose scenario they are literally a part of, they are permanently altered by the over-stimulation and trauma.

Parental alienation is not just a social problem; it's an insidious disease with permanent consequences for developing brains.

Dallas Man Acquitted of Molestation Conviction based on allegations in Custody Case after 15 years

The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals recently issued a order exonerating a Dallas father accused of molesting two of his young daughters during a heated custody battle and then being wrongly convicted based on testimony of the two girls, then 6 and 4. The dad was convicted, spent 2 1/2 years in prison, and then was released as a convicted sex offender. He had steadfastly maintained his innocence, and after his daughters reached adulthood, they recanted their childhood testimony completely, and admitted that they had decided that the adults weren't going to listen to them so they "just told them what they wanted to hear". The father, once a lawyer, was working as a truck driver at the time of his exoneration, and has been reunited with his daughters.

While this is an extreme example of parental alienation in a custody case, allegations of sexual abuse in too many custody cases. Based on overall occurrence of sexual abuse outside the context of divorce litigation, the incidence of father-daughter incest is very low (less than 1 in 1000 families or less) with the validation of incest occurring in more than 95% of reported cases. In the context of divorce litigation however, the number of reported cases is relatively high (10% of divorce cases or more), but with the validation of those reports occurring in fewer than 5% of those cases. Bottom line, incest allegations in divorce cases are almost always FALSE, while incest allegations in outside the custody arena are almost always TRUE. Of course, base rates don't determine the facts in a single case, but they constitute an important contextual clue about what is LIKELY to be going on in an individual case.

Despite the decline of such serious allegations in divorce cases over the last 25 years, parents in contested custody cases continue to make false allegations about the behavior of their spouses and to coach their children about "bad things" the other parent has done or is doing. These parents, many of whom have very poor judgment, a blurry line between fantasy and reality, and a "black and white" view of the world and the people in it, do not appreciate the damage that they are doing to the children in the zeal to win the "custody battle". The long term research on the effects of divorce on children continues to show that the best predictor of damage to children in divorce is the result of ongoing conflict between the parents--when parents continue to fight, children are harmed--period.

Professionals involved with divorcing families and the parents who are divorcing must all recognize that when parents attack each other in court during the months of the divorce litigation, the children are damaged for the next 20 YEARS or more. I am sure NO parent really wants that kind of future for their children.

So given these risks, what are some alternatives?

1. Even when divorcing, agree to disagree without including the children.
2. Give the children access and visitation with both parents.
3. Avoid making allegations without objective proof substantiated by a third party.
4. When in doubt, don't.
5. If you really suspect child abuse, find a mental health professional with LOTS of experience in child abuse and child abuse allegations in divorce cases and let them decide whether to file a report about the "abuse".

Needy Woman--Disengaged Man Pattern

The needy woman-disengaged man is probably the most volatile and contentious pattern that I have seen in more than 30 years of dealing with divorcing couples. These couples are far more likely to litigate, and although they all eventually get divorced, the legal divorce is seldom the end of the conflict. What follows is a brief description of the individuals, followed by a summary of how the divorce process unfolds for these unfortunate people and their children. It is important to remember that "it takes two to tango" and to a large extent, these patterns require both spouses in order to play out the drama. The more that each partner fits the individual patterns described below, the greater the chaos, and the more closely the divorce will follow the "worst case" scenario.

The most visible partner in this scenario and the likely "identified patient" is the woman. She is likely to be attractive, bright, sociable, well-dressed, articulate, and frequently insightful about her husband and his motivations but blind to her own. These women usually make a good first impression, unless they are having one of their frequent "melt downs"--then they will be anxious, depressed (even suicidal), irrational, and even paranoid. Logical thinking will be a challenge, and it will be hard for them to learn about the slow and confusing legal process, so they will be a difficult client to manage.

Emotionally, divorce represents the realization of the greatest fear of these women-being abandoned. These women will develop rapid and intense attachments to lawyers and mental health professionals, and will barrage them with phone calls and emails with little recognition of the impact of their behavior on others (just like in the rest of their lives). They will appear to be remarkably helpless and unable to follow through with tasks related to their lives or their divorces, despite the outward appearance of competence and success that may well be apparent in their social or professional lives. These women are frequently misusing either drugs or alcohol or both, and are highly addiction prone (it could be food, sex, caffeine, xanax, or wine). They have a very "black and white" view of the world, and readily split people and events into either "all good" or "all bad" categories, and are rarely able to be balanced and objective.

As mothers, these women tend to be overly involved ("enmeshed") with their children or inappropriately disengaged. When there is more than one child, both patterns could be evident, with a "good" child and "bad" child ("just like his/her father"). Moms frequently have real difficulties being separated from their children, making visitation very challenging, and with mom distorting or exaggerating the bad experiences of their children when visiting dad. This separation anxiety is frequently evident to the children, who often express the need to "take care of" mom or just act out and complain about dad to a degree that is not supported by the facts as a way to be loyal to mom.

Many, though not all, of these women meet most or all of the diagnostic criteria for the DSM-IV personality disorder "Borderline Personality"(BPD). Many mental health professionals, knowing that they are likely to be deposed or called to testify in a divorce, will avoid diagnosing BPD because of the stigma attached to this diagnosis. BPD is difficult to treat, takes 2-5 years of twice per week psychotherapy, and has a poor prognosis without treatment (chronic "stable instability" with vulnerability to recurrent depression and anxiety and heightened suicide risk). Many less well-trained mental health professionals won't recognize the pattern at all, and will naively support the exaggerated and distorted claims of mistreatment made by many of these women.

The men in this drama may be disengaged for a number of reasons, but they will almost always appear to be quite distant and emotionally uninvolved by the time of the divorce. Many times the men have filed for divorce, although a substantial number will be the respondent after the wife discovers some infidelity. These two sub-groups of men are quite different in their outward appearance and emotional makeup. First, the ego-driven husbands.

These men are smart, successful, extremely self-confident, and almost clinical in their approach to divorce. Many are executives and medical professionals and high profile community figures. They can be both calculating and cruel in their treatment of their spouse and children, and frequently quickly replace the wife with a "newer model". Their capacity for empathy is limited or absent, and they will treat everyone they deal with a replaceable commodity. Many of them have had one or more affairs with secretaries or assistants, or like Governor Spitzer, used high price escorts.

Ironically, these men share the same black and white thinking style as their spouse, and will find it hard to be objective about their now "worthless *****" of a wife. While their thinking is less impaired than that of their wife, their judgment is usually equally poor, and they can act in remarkably thoughtless and self-defeating ways because they believe that "the rules don't apply" to them, and that they won't get caught or punished.

These men probably meet some or all of the criteria to be called "narcissistic personality disorders (NPD)" in DSM-IV terms, but they will NOT be in treatment nor interested in it. Because they sincerely believe in their own superior intelligence and perfection, therapy is a joke to them.

The other group of disengaged men is more healthy than the ego-driven group, but nonetheless emotionally disengaged. These men usually make impulsive and poorly considered commitments to marry the needy, dependent, borderline women as a way to avoid being alone. They are usually quiet, smart, conforming men who are attracted to the charismatic, extraverted persona that these women present when they are "on the market". Usually, the men describe how their wives changed overnight once "the deal was sealed", and they are reluctant, regretful participants in the divorce process, not the "take no prisoners" litigants like the ego-driven men. After many unsuccessful attempts to work out compromises with these unstable and uncompromising women, the men withdraw from the wives out of frustration and in self-defense until they decide they have had enough.

The classic "War of the Roses" divorce scenario is played out between the borderline woman and the narcissistic man. Allegations are exchanged without consideration of the consequences for the children, and actual parental alienation--active attempts by both parents to smear the other parent and to enlist the children in the conflict--are the norm. Allegations of abuse or neglect are also the norm, and sometimes are true (the base rate for truthful abuse allegations in divorce cases is under 5%). Husbands almost always have control of the money in these relationships, and use the children as leverage to minimize their financial exposure in the final settlement. The women frequently want to use the legal system to extract "justice" for the behavior of their husbands, and make unwise decisions to prolong the litigation and thereby remain negatively engaged with the husbands. Husbands frequently accuse the wife of being "crazy" or "unstable" and a danger to the children, even though they have usually been uninvolved as parents prior to the divorce. Ironically, both spouses are in some respects "right" in their claims about the other, although the exaggeration and hyperbole makes both stories hard to believe.Litigation is usually protracted and needlessly expensive, and terminated in some kind of "lose-lose" settlement agreement for both property and custody of the children.

The big losers in this drama are the children, who usually end up spending more time with mom and never establishing a good connection to dad, even if he faithfully exercises visitation. Conflict between the parents usually continues throughout the child's life, leading to emotional behavioral problems, and and as the research shows, handicaps the children in their ability to form intimate relationships as an adult.

Discussion of the other patterns to follow.