Improving the Quality of Child Custody Evaluations
A Systematic Model
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Beschreibung
Improving the Quality of Child Custody Evaluations
A Systematic Model
Lauren Woodward Tolle, Ph.D. and William O’Donohue, Ph.D.
In the best interests of the child. This phrase has guided child custody evaluators for decades. But how do the professionals tasked with evaluation understand a child’s best interests? Can it be assumed that two evaluators will come to the same decision given the same case? What evidence-based methods are—or should be—involved?
Improving the Quality of Child Custody Evaluations raises significant questions of accuracy, reliability, and validity in the way even the best-intentioned evaluations are conducted, and proposes standardized guidelines for correction. Identifying conceptual as well as empirical shortcomings in the evaluation process, the authors analyze the current state of custody evaluation protocols and the welter of laws surrounding the concept of the best interests of the child. An empirically-based framework, the Egregious/Promotive Factors Model, is presented as a reliable alternative, supported by rigorous assessment tools and backed by the results of a pilot study of the model among family court judges. Throughout, the book never loses sight of the optimum end result: a reliable foundation for children’s future well-being. Included in the coverage:
- Current controversies in custody arrangements.
- Current controversies in custody guidelines.
- Review of the post-divorce child outcome literature.
- Evolution of the Egregious/Promotive Factors Model (EPFM).
- Assessing risk and positive factors in parenting.
- Preliminary support for the EPFM.
This book resolves a key problem that all evaluators need to attend to:, i.e., what constructs ought to be measured?, all the while giving them practical ways of doing this. It also presents data showing family court judges like the model, and it does this fairly briefly but in a way that is nicely embedded in the research literature.
Discusses the past and current state of science regarding child custody evaluations with a focus on the construct of the best interest of the child Proposes a preliminary model (the Egregious/Promotive Factors Model) in order to conduct improved child custody evaluations Identifies and reviews psychological assessments that can reliably measure risk and promotive factors to support the Egregious/Promotive Factors Model ?
Autor*in
Lauren Woodward Tolle
Themen in »Improving the Quality of Child Custody Evaluations«
Child abuse Child custody evaluations Custody arrangement controversies Excessive interparental conflict Father's rights movement Parent mental health problems Parent school involvement Parent-child relationships Parenting alliance measure Parenting relationship questionnaire Parenting skills Same sex custody The child behavior The parenting stress index
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"The book Improving the Quality of Child Custody Evaluations: A Systematic Model by Tolle and O’Donohue provides a useful summary of what relevant factors to consider, based on empirical work on the effects of divorce on children, and how relevant and valid data can be obtained to inform a decision, for example, with the help of psychological tests...
An interesting part of the book is its review of empirical work on the effects of divorce: Tolle and O’Donohue discuss its effects on children’s psychological well-being, family well-being, socioeconomic well-being, self-concept, social competence, and physical health problems. However, there is a lack of critical discussion of the causal inferences that can be drawn from such work. Several alternative explanations usually are pertinent, such as genetic ones (Kennair, 2003; Paris, 2000).
The extensive discussions of psychometric properties of various instruments such as psychological tests are probably useful to a practitioner, but they tend to be somewhat dull reading. The authors stress the importance of impression management in assessments for custody evaluations, in which much tends to be at stake for the parents. This is a very difficult problem in many applications of psychometric methods (Griffith & Peterson, 2006)...
This book should be a useful reference to psychologists working on custody cases. The reviews of research on effects of divorce on children and on the validity of methods used in custody assessments are useful. Furthermore, there is clearly a need for structuringinformation in such cases and integrating it as objectively as possible. The authors should be applauded for the attempt to develop a scientifically based methodology for child custody evaluations, and future research should be conducted to assess its value in practical work."
Reviewed by Lennart Sjöberg
PsycCRITIQUES, May 29, 2013, Vol. 58, Release 22, Article 6
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