Trauma Reenactment in Parental Alienation

At its foundational core, the family processes of attachment-based “parental alienation” represent the manifestation of a trauma reenactment narrative of a narcissistic/(borderline) parent that is embedded in the distorted “internal working models,” or “schemas,” of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent’s attachment networks.

The narcissistic/(borderline) parent is psychologically decompensating into persecutory delusional beliefs due to the activation of excessive anxiety surrounding the perceived interpersonal rejection and perceived abandonment associated with the divorce (sometimes the triggering of this perceived rejection and abandonment is delayed until the spouse remarries).

One of the foremost experts in personality disorders, Theodore Millon, describes the propensity for the narcissistic personality structure to decompensate into persecutory delusional beliefs under stress,

“Under conditions of unrelieved adversity and failure, narcissists may decompensate into paranoid disorders. Owing to their excessive use of fantasy mechanisms, they are disposed to misinterpret events and to construct delusional beliefs. Unwilling to accept constraints on their independence and unable to accept the viewpoints of others, narcissists may isolate themselves from the corrective effects of shared thinking. Alone, they may ruminate and weave their beliefs into a network of fanciful and totally invalid suspicions. Among narcissists, delusions often take form after a serious challenge or setback has upset their image of superiority and omnipotence. They tend to exhibit compensatory grandiosity and jealousy delusions in which they reconstruct reality to match the image they are unable or unwilling to give up. Delusional systems may also develop as a result of having felt betrayed and humiliated. Here we may see the rapid unfolding of persecutory delusions and an arrogant grandiosity characterized by verbal attacks and bombast.”

The reenactment of attachment trauma is also documented in the clinical treatment literature,

“Reenactments of the traumatic past are common in the treatment of this population and frequently represent either explicit or coded repetitions of the unprocessed trauma in an attempt at mastery. Reenactments can be expressed psychologically, relationally, and somatically and may occur with conscious intent or with little awareness. One primary transference-countertransference dynamic involves reenactment of familiar roles of victim, perpetrator–rescuer-bystander in the therapy relationship. Therapist and client play out these roles, often in complementary fashion with one another, as they relive various aspects of the client’s early attachment relationships. (Perlman & Courtois, 2005, p. 455)

In response to three separate but interrelated psychological stresses associated with the divorce, 1) the threatened collapse of the narcissistic defenses against the experience of primal inadequacy that is triggered by the perceived interpersonal rejection inherent to the divorce (i.e., narcissistic personality processes), 2) the activation of immense anxiety from severe abandonment fears triggered by the divorce (i.e., borderline personality processes), and 3) the reactivation of attachment trauma networks when the attachment system becomes active to mediate the loss experience associated with the divorce (trauma processes), the narcissistic/(borderline) personality decompensates into persecutory delusional beliefs centering on the other parent’s “abuse” potential relative to the child.

This decompensation into persecutory delusional beliefs is centered around the pattern contained in the internal working models (schemas) of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent’s traumatized attachment networks of 1) victimized child, 2) abusive parent, 3) protective parent. The split representation for the parent role in the attachment trauma networks is the product of the “splitting” dynamic that originated in the relationship trauma involving a parent (i.e, the parent of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent as a child) who simultaneously triggers attachment bonding and avoidance motivations.

“Various studies have found that patients with BPD [borderline personality disorder] are characterized by disorganized attachment representations (Fonagy et al., 1996; Patrick et al, 1994). Such attachment representations appear to be typical for persons with unresolved childhood traumas, especially when parental figures were involved, with direct, frightening behavior by the parent. Disorganized attachment is considered to result from an unresolvable situation for the child when “the parent is at the same time the source of fright as well as the potential haven of safety” (van IJzendoorn, Schuengel, & Bakermans-Kranburg, 1999, p. 226).” (Beck et al., 2004, p. 191)

The family processes of attachment-based “parental alienation” are the product of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent creating a reenactment in the current family relationships of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent’s own attachment trauma patterns, or “schemas,” by inducing the child into adopting the “victimized child” role within the trauma reenactment narrative. The moment the child is induced into adopting the “victimized child” role, then this automatically IMPOSES upon, and DEFINES, the targeted parent into the role as the “abusive parent” in the trauma reenactment narrative. The definitions of these two trauma reenactment roles (which are created the moment the child adopts the “victimized child” role) then allows the narcissistic/(borderline) parent to adopt the coveted role in the trauma reenactment narrative as the wonderful and nurturing “protective parent,” in direct contrast to the role being imposed on the other parent as the all-bad “abusive parent.”

This artificially created reenactment of “various aspects” of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent’s own “early attachment relationships” (Perlman & Courtois, 2005, p. 455) represents a false drama in which the present is distorted into a re-creation of the past.

This is psychotic. The narcissistic/(borderline) parent is no longer in touch with actual reality, but is reliving and recreating early attachment relationships that do not reflect actual events in the current world.

The very term “borderline” to describe this type of personality process reflects the recognition of the psychotic core to this type of personality structure,

“The diagnosis of “borderline” was introduced in the 1930s to label patients with problems that seemed to fall somewhere in between neurosis and psychosis. (Beck et al, 2004, p. 189)

Narcissistic and borderline personality structures are simply variants of the same core processes.

“One subgroup of borderline patients, namely, the narcissistic personalities… seem to have a defensive organization similar to borderline conditions, and yet many of them function on a much better psychosocial level.” (Kernberg, 1975, p. xiii)

Delusions and Psychotic Processes

Many people in the general public, and many mental health professionals, have the mistaken belief that psychotic and delusional processes will manifest as overtly “crazy” and bizarre.  That’s not true.

Prior to obtaining my doctorate degree I first obtained a Master’s degree in Community/Clinical psychology and I worked for 15 years on a clinical research project at UCLA on schizophreria.  During my time with this project I was trained to clinical competence on a symptom rating scale called the Brief Psychiatric Rating Scale (BPRS) on which a variety of patient symptoms are rated, including psychotic symptoms, along a 7-point scale from mild to severe.

Psychotic symptoms can manifest along a continuum of severity, and are not always overtly bizarre.  This is especially true for a diagnosis of Delusional Disorder in which the only manifestation of the psychotic process is the presence of an intransigently held, fixed and false belief that is maintained despite contrary evidence.

The diagnostic criteria for the DSM-5 diagnosis of a Delusional Disorder specifically requires that that person’s general functioning is “not markedly impaired” or “obviously odd or bizarre.”

DSM-5 Delusional Disorder

Criterion C: “Apart from the impact of the delusion(s) or its ramifications, functioning is not markedly impaired and behavior is not obviously odd or bizarre.“

The delusional belief of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent in attachment-based “parental alienation” would be considered a nonbizarre “encapsulated” delusion.

Nonbizarre delusions express content that is within the realm of possibility, such as a fixed and false belief that the person’s spouse is having an extramarital affair. It’s possible that the person’s spouse is having an affair, extramarital affairs are not a bizarre occurrence, but it’s simply not true that the person’s spouse is having an extramarital affair.  Yet no amount of contrary evidence will convince the person that his or her belief in the spouse’s infidelity is wrong. The false belief is maintained despite contrary evidence.

An encapsulated delusion is limited and contained in its scope.  The jealousy delusion noted above would be an encapsulated delusion.  It’s presence and impact would not generally be evident.  Unless you asked the person specifically about the martial relationship you might never know of the existence of this delusional belief.

A bizarre delusion on the other hand, might be that people were inserting thoughts into the person’s mind (called “a delusion of control”). This false belief is outside the realm of plausibility.  This would also not be an encapsulated delusion since it affects a broad spectrum of the person’s perceptions and functioning.

The narcissistic/(borderline) parent’s delusional belief in attachment-based “parental alienation” stems from the trauma reenactment narrative and is the false belief that the other parent represents an abusive threat to the child.  It is delusional because this belief in the threat potential of the targeted parent is false and yet is maintained despite contrary evidence, it is a nonbizarre delusional belief because it is within the domain of possibility that a parent is abusive of a child, and it is an encapsulated delusion because this fixed and false belief is limited to only a narrow and contained domain of distortion, the perception of the other parent, and is not a false belief that affects a broad spectrum of the person’s perception.

At a deeper level, the delusional belief of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent in the abusive parenting threat posed to the child by the targeted parent represents a component of a trauma reenactment in which the narcissistic/(borderline) parent distorts current reality into creating and reliving a reenactment of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent’s own childhood attachment trauma patterns.

Remember what Millon said about the decompensation of the narcissistic personality under stress,

“Unwilling to accept constraints on their independence and unable to accept the viewpoints of others, narcissists may isolate themselves from the corrective effects of shared thinking. Alone, they may ruminate and weave their beliefs into a network of fanciful and totally invalid suspicions.

The rumination and weaving of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent in which they “reconstruct reality” is guided by the attachment patterns embedded in the internal working models, or schemas, of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent’s attachment system.  The distorted beliefs take on the pattern of the attachment trauma, abusive parent – victimized child – protective parent.  It is the trauma reenactment narrative that is the fundamental psychotic process, of which the narcissistic/(borderline) parent’s delusional belief in the abusive threat posed by the other parent is a surface manifestation.

The psychological processes associated with attachment-based “parental alienation” represent the interwoven expression within the family relationships of 1) personality disorder processes, 2) trauma-related processes, and 3) psychotic processes (i.e., the decompensation of narcissistic/(borderline) personality structures into delusional belief systems).

The presence of a delusional belief DOES NOT mean the person will act in an overtly abnormal way, and in the case of a narcissistic/(borderline) personality the person’s nonbizarre persecutory delusional belief may go entirely unrecognized by other people, including mental health professionals, who may mistakenly accept the plausible assertions of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent as valid. 

After all, the story offered by the narcissistic/(borderline) parent is not abnormal or bizarre, it’s not uncommon for a parent to be a bad parent who presents a risk of emotional abuse for a child, especially when the child is backing up this storyline, the narrative of the trauma reenactment, by adopting the role as the “victimized child,”  And the narcissistic/(borderline) parent presents so well, as articulate and self-assured, and as being so protective and caring for the child’s well-being.  Who suspects a delusional reenactment of childhood trauma when presented with this storyline.

A nonbizarre delusional belief is not always evident.

Professional Competence

The presence of psychotic processes is an extremely serious expression of psychopathology. That many mental health professionals are simply not recognizing and diagnosing the extreme psychopathology involved represents a highly disturbing reflection of the inadequate professional competence of these mental health professionals.

Personality disorders, the attachment system, trauma disorders, and delusional disorders are ALL established DSM constructs. There is absolutely no reason whatsoever for mental health professionals to be missing the level of severe psychopathology involved. 

It doesn’t matter what their opinions are about the construct of “parental alienation,” they are required by professional practice standards to be knowledgeable about DSM disorders, particularly if they are treating that type of DSM disorder.

If a mental health professional is diagnosing and treating the family sequelae of trauma-related reenactments of a narcissistic/(borderline) parent’s psychological decompensation into delusional belief systems, in which the child is enacting the “victimized child” role within the reenactment narrative of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent’s traumatized attachment networks, then the diagnosing and treating mental health professional better know about trauma reenactments,  narcissistic and borderline personality presentations and processes, and the nature of “internal working models” of the attachment system.

If a plastic surgeon decides to diagnose and treat cancer without possessing the requisite knowledge, training, and background necessary for professional competence, and the patient dies because of the lack of professional knowledge and competence of the plastic surgeon in diagnosing and treating cancer, this would likely be considered malpractice.

If a podiatrist suddenly decided to do brain surgery on a patient’s brain tumor, and the patient dies as a result of the podiatrist’s lack of professional knowledge and competence regarding brain surgery, this would likely be considered malpractice.

Why is it considered malpractice in the medical profession for a doctor to practice beyond the boundaries of his or her professional knowledge and competence but it’s not considered malpractice in mental health?  Oh wait, it is considered malpractice in mental health too.

Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct of the American Psychological Association (2002)

Standard 2.02 Boundaries of Competence

“Psychologists provide services, teach and conduct research with populations and in areas only within the boundaries of their competence, based on their education, training, supervised experience, consultation, study or professional experience.”

It doesn’t matter what they may think about the Gardnerian construct of “Parental Alienation Syndrome” or if they are familiar with the attachment-based model of “parental alienation” described in my writings and in my Master Lecture Series seminars.  Because all of the constructs I describe in an attachment-based model of “parental alienation” are established and accepted psychological constructs within the DSM diagnostic system, AND all of the constructs have a solid and established foundation in the research base of professional psychology.

It doesn’t matter if the plastic surgeon says that he doesn’t believe in this so-callled cancer disease (or never heard of cancer).  If a physician is going to diagnose and treat cancer then it is incumbent upon the physician to ensure that he or she has the necessary professional knowledge and expertise to diagnose and treat cancer. 

“Whoops, my mistake. Didn’t know what I was doing. Sorry.” is NOT an acceptable answer if the patient dies as a result of the professional’s lack of appropriate knowledge and professional competence.

It doesn’t matter if the podiatrist THINKS she can do brain surgery because she went to medical school.  To do brain surgery requires specialized professional knowledge and expertise.  Just because a physician went to medical school does not necessarily mean the physician is competent to do brain surgery without first taking steps to acquire the specialized professional knowledge and training necessary for brain surgery.

There is nothing “NEW” regarding an attachment-based model of “parental alienation” except that these established psychological constructs are being applied to the family processes traditionally called “parental alienation.” ALL of the psychological principles and constructs discussed in an attachment-based model of “parental alienation” are firmly established and accepted psychological principles and constructs that should be part of the professional competence for ALL mental health professionals generally, and particularly for mental health professionals who are diagnosing and treating this set of psychological issues.

If you don’t know what you’re diagnosing and treating, you should probably stay away from diagnosing and treating it.

Notice that in all of my writings, I put the term “parental alienation” in quotes. That’s because the term “parental alienation” represents a popularized lay term for the psychopathology involved.

The correct clinical term is pathogenic parenting (i.e., patho=pathological; genic=genesis, creation). The term pathogenic parenting refers to the creation of psychopathology in a child through aberrant and distorted parenting practices, and the actual clinical psychopathology involved is the psychological decompensation of a narcissistic/(borderline) parent into delusional belief systems that are manifesting through a reenactment of attachment trauma patterns into current family relationships.

When I first entered private practice from my position as the Clinical Director for a children’s assessment and treatment center I knew nothing about the construct of “parental alienation.”  My areas of specialty are ADHD, parent-child conflict, and marital and family therapy, and I have a secondary expertise in early childhood mental health and the neuro-development of the brain during childhood. 

When I ran across my first case of “parental alienation,” however, I was able to recognize the personality disorder processes, the delusional belief systems, and the trauma reenactment.  In my early writings on “parental alienation” I was discussing this clinical phenomenon as warranting the DSM-IV TR diagnosis of a Shared Psychotic Disorder and I was noting the descriptions contained within the DSM-IV TR regarding a Shared Psychotic Disorder diagnosis and the family processes traditionally described as “parental alienation,”

DSM-IV TR – Shared Psychotic Disorder:

“The essential features of Shared Psychotic Disorder (Folie a Deux) is a delusion that develops in an individual who is involved in a close relationship with another person (sometimes termed the “inducer” or “the primary case”) who already has a Psychotic Disorder with prominent delusions (Criteria A).” (American Psychiatric Association, DSM-IV TR, 2000,p. 332)

“Usually the primary case in Shared Psychotic Disorder is dominant in the relationship and gradually imposes the delusional system on the more passive and initially healthy second person. Individuals who come to share delusional beliefs are often related by blood or marriage and have lived together for a long time, sometimes in relative isolation. If the relationship with the primary case is interrupted, the delusional beliefs of the other individual usually diminish or disappear. Although most commonly seen in relationships of only two people, Shared Psychotic Disorder can occur in larger number of individuals, especially in family situations in which the parent is the primary case and the children, sometimes to varying degrees, adopt the parent’s delusional beliefs.” (American Psychiatric Association, DSM-IV TR, 2000,p. 333)

“Aside from the delusional beliefs, behavior is usually not otherwise odd or unusual in Shared Psychotic Disorder.” (American Psychiatric Association, DSM-IV TR, 2000, p. 333)

With regard to the course of Shared Psychotic Disorder, the DSM-IV TR notes,

“Without intervention, the course is usually chronic, because this disorder most commonly occurs in relationships that are long-standing and resistant to change. With separation from the primary case, the individual’s delusional beliefs disappear, sometimes quickly and sometimes quite slowly.” (American Psychiatric Association, DSM-IV TR, 2000, p. 333)

When the diagnosis of Shared Psychotic Disorder was discontinued in the DSM-5 I wrote a paper currently up on my website in which I analyzed the clinical psychopathology of an attachment-based model for the construct of “parental alienation” relative to the newly revised DSM-5 diagnostic system, and I concluded that the clinical psychopathology represents a DSM-5 diagnosis of,

DSM-5 Diagnosis

309.4   Adjustment Disorder with mixed disturbance of emotions and conduct

V61.20   Parent-Child Relational Problem

V61.29   Child Affected by Parental Relationship Distress

V995.51 Child Psychological Abuse, Confirmed

Of note, is that the diagnosis of Adjustment Disorder in the DSM-5 is in the category of “Trauma– & Stressor-Related Disorders.”

The clinical psychopathology involved is all comprised of standard psychological principles and constructs.  It is beyond me why this pathology hasn’t been identified and resolved earlier, other than the possibility that the field was so distracted by the debate over the Gardnerian model of PAS that no one bothered to define the pathology from within standard and established psychological principles and constructs.

The pathology is there, and it is clearly evident to anyone with a knowledge of the relevant domains of pathology, and ALL mental health professionals should have at least a basic knowledge of these relevant domains (i.e., personality disorders, delusions, trauma, the attachment system) as part of their foundational understanding of the DSM diagnostic system, since all of these constructs are in the DSM diagnostic system . 

I want to make sure I am entirely clear on this, ALL of the psychological constructs associated with an attachment-based model for the construct of “parental alienation” are established and accepted principles and constructs currently within professional psychology and the DSM diagnostic system.  There is absolutely NO REASON why mental health professionals have not, and are not currently, making the appropriate clinical and DSM-5 diagnosis of the pathology.

  • Narcissistic and borderline personality disorders are established and recognized constructs within the DSM diagnostic system.
  • Delusional beliefs are established and recognized constructs within the DSM diagnostic system.
  • The attachment system is a recognized construct within the DSM diagnostic system, and the attachment system has a substantial research base establishing it as a primary professional construct.
  • Trauma is a recognized construct within the DSM diagnostic system, and the construct of trauma has a substantial research base establishing it as a primary professional construct, including trauma reenactment.

Trauma Reenactment

Regarding the reenactment of trauma, van der Kolk describes the impact of childhood exposure to “developmental trauma,”

“After a child is traumatized multiple times, the imprint of the trauma becomes lodged in many aspects of his or her makeup… Unless this tendency to repeat the trauma is recognized, the response of the environment is likely to replay the original traumatizing, abusive, but familiar, relationships.” (van der Kolk 2005)

The recognition of trauma reenactment also includes the association of borderline personality symptoms to trauma reenactment processes:

Trippany, R. L., Helm, H. M., & Simpson, L. (2006). Trauma reenactment: Rethinking borderline personality disorder when diagnosing sexual abuse survivors. Journal of Mental Health Counseling, 28(2), 95-110.

As is the role of attachment trauma reenactments in the treatment of trauma-related disorders:

Pearlman, C.A., Courtois, C.A. (2005). Clinical Applications of the Attachment Framework: Relational Treatment of Complex Trauma. Journal of Traumatic Stress, 18, 449-459

According to van der Kolk,

“When the trauma fails to be integrated into the totality of a person’s life experiences, the victim remains fixated on the trauma. Despite avoidance of emotional involvement, traumatic memories cannot be avoided: even when pushed out of waking consciousness, they come back in the form of reenactments, nightmares, or feelings related to the trauma… Recurrences may continue throughout life during periods of stress.” (van der Kolk, 1987, p. 5)

There is absolutely NO REASON that the pathology associated with an attachment-based model for the construct of “parental alienation” is not currently recognized and addressed within mental health OTHER than professional ignorance and incompetence.

It is NOT an issue of “parental alienation,” the pathology being expressed in the family processes involves standard, established, and accepted constructs of psychopathology.

If ANY targeted parent is in a position of educating a mental health professional regarding the nature or degree of the psychopathology involved with the construct of attachment-based “parental alienation” then this is clear evidence that a podiatrist is doing brain surgery, i.e., that the mental health professional is practicing beyond the boundaries of professional competence in likely violation of professional practice standards. 

ALL diagnosing and treating mental health professionals should be sufficiently knowledgeable so that it is the mental health professional who is educating the targeted parent regarding the personality disorder dynamics, the delusional processes, the reenactment narrative structure, and the attachment system distortions involved in attachment-based “parental alienation,” NOT the other way around.

I have two invited Master Lecture Series seminars available online through California Southern University in which I discuss at a professional level the nature and severity of the pathology.  Mental health professionals can watch these seminars to become educated and aware of the pathology involved. 

It is NOT about “parental alienation.”  All of the involved principles and constructs are established and accepted principles and constructs within the DSM diagnostic system and the established professional research base.

If you don’t know what you are diagnosing and treating, then you probably shouldn’t be diagnosing and treating it.

Podiatrists are not allowed to perform brain surgery, plastic surgeons are not allowed to treat cancer.

Craig Childress, Psy.D.
Clinical Psychologist, PSY 18857

References

Personality Disorder

Millon. T. (2011). Disorders of personality: introducing a DSM/ICD spectrum from normal to abnormal. Hoboken: Wiley.

Beck, A.T., Freeman, A., Davis, D.D., & Associates (2004). Cognitive therapy of personality disorders. (2nd edition). New York: Guilford.

Kernberg, O.F. (1975). Borderline conditions and pathological narcissism.. New York: Aronson.

Trauma Reenactment

Pearlman, C.A., Courtois, C.A. (2005). Clinical Applications of the Attachment Framework: Relational Treatment of Complex Trauma. Journal of Traumatic Stress, 18, 449-459

van der Kolk, B.A. (2005). Developmental trauma disorder. Psychiatric Annals, 35(5), 401-408.

van der Kolk, B.A. (1987). The psychological consequences of overwhelming life experiences. In B.A. van der Kolk (Ed.) Psychological Trauma (1-30). Washington, D.C.: American Psychiatric Press, Inc.

Trippany, R. L., Helm, H. M., & Simpson, L. (2006). Trauma reenactment: Rethinking borderline personality disorder when diagnosing sexual abuse survivors. Journal of Mental Health Counseling, 28(2), 95-110.

Professional Standards

American Psychiatric Association. (2000). Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders (Revised 4th ed.). Washington, DC: Author.

American Psychological Association (2002). Ethical principles of psychologists and code of conduct. American Psychologist, 57, 1060-1073.

False Allegations of Parental Alienation

 Not everything is “parental alienation.”

Sometimes a child’s desire to avoid a relationship with one parent is justified by the parenting practice of that parent.

In about 25% of the cases that come to me because of my expertise in “parental alienation” the narcissistic parent turns out to be the targeted parent who is seeking my help in fostering the child’s relationship with this narcissistic parent because this parent feels entitled to possess the narcissistic object of the child.

This parent’s absence of empathic resonance for the child’s inner experience becomes clearly evident in the first few sessions with this narcissistic parent.  The child’s experience isn’t relevant to this parent, only the experience of the narcissistic parent is relevant in this parent’s perception.

Since the narcissistic parent has a fixed belief in his or her own perfection and wonderfulness, in their view there can be no other reason for the child’s reluctance to provide them with the narcissistic supply of adoration other than “parental alienation.”

In these cases, the child does NOT display the three diagnostic indicators of attachment-based “parental alienation” (Diagnostic Indicators and Associated Clinical Signs), and when I meet with the favored parent, this favored parent is entirely normal-range and does not display any narcissistic or borderline traits. 

Only the targeted parent displays narcissistic/(borderline) traits, and the child’s complaints about the absence of empathy of this parent makes total sense to me as a psychologist.  I see this narcissistic parent’s absence of empathy displayed in our sessions.  I know exactly what the child is saying.

Not everything is “parental alienation.”  Sometimes it is the targeted parent who is narcissistic.

Living with a Narcissistic Parent

In these false “parental alienation” cases, the profound absence of parental empathy of the narcissistic parent is experienced by the child as emotionally and psychologically painful.

There is interesting research by Moor and Silvern (2006) on the association of child abuse to parental empathic failure which found that parental empathic failure actually represents a form of psychological trauma for the child.

“The indication that posttraumatic symptoms were no longer associated with child abuse, across all categories, after statistically controlling for the effect of perceived parental empathy might appear surprising at first, as trauma symptoms are commonly conceived of as connected to specifically terrorizing aspects of maltreatment (e.g., Wind & Silvern, 1994).

However, this finding is, in fact, entirely consistent with both Kohut’s (1977) and Winnicott’s (1988) conception of the traumatic nature of parental empathic failure. In this view, parental failure of empathy is predicted to amount to a traumatic experience in itself over time, and subsequently to result in trauma-related stress. Interestingly, even though this theoretical conceptualization of trauma differs in substantial ways from the modern use of the term, it was still nonetheless captured by the present measures.” (Moor & Silvern, 2006, p. 197)

Moor, A. and Silvern, L. (2006). Identifying pathways linking child abuse to psychological outcome: The mediating role of perceived parental failure of empathy. Journal of Emotional Abuse, 6, 91-112.

The absence of parental empathy is painful, and severe failures of parental empathy, such as those associated with a narcissistic parent, are traumatic for the child.

When a child is exposed to chronic and severe failures of parental empathy, such as from a narcissistic parent, the child will seek to avoid the psychologically painful relationship with this parent. The child’s efforts to avoid a relationship with a narcissistic parent represent a normal-range and healthy protective response to the chronic and severe failure of parental empathy associated with narcissistic parenting practices.

A child seeking to avoid a relationship with a narcissistic parent represents an authentic response of the child to severe and chronic failures of parental empathy.

A narcissistic parent is incapable of empathy. For the narcissistic parent, the child is an object; a possession. The narcissistic parent cannot resonate with the child’s inner needs and experiences. For the narcissistic parent only the narcissistic supply that the child offers the narcissistic parent is important.

In their relationship, only one person exists, the narcissistic parent. The child’s authenticity is not acknowledged, the child’s authenticity is nullified and obliterated so that the child can serve as a narcissistic reflection of the parent’s own self-experience.

In these cases of false allegations of “parental alienation,” the child experiences a relationship with the narcissistic parent as being painful and tries to communicate this to the narcissistic parent. However, the narcissistic parent is unable to self-reflect and deflects the authentic criticism of the child as being invalid. The narcissistic parent is entirely unable to comprehend why the child wouldn’t want to adore and become the narcissistic possession of the magnificent wonderfulness of the narcissistic parent.

Over time, the child becomes discouraged that the narcissistic parent will ever be able to show empathic care and responsiveness for the child’s authenticity, so that the child begins to withdraw from a relationship with the narcissistic parent because the relationship is too painful, the relationship with the narcissistic parent is experienced as being psychologically traumatic for the child.

The narcissistic parent, however, cannot abide criticism –

“I’m not at fault. I’m perfect. You’re the problem, not me. I’m wonderful.”

So then why is the child critical of the “wonderful” narcissistic parent? Why does the child seek to avoid a relationship with the “perfect” narcissistic parent? The only answer the narcissistic parent can come up with is that it must be “parental alienation” by the other parent. What else could account for the child’s criticisms and rejection of the perfection and wonderfulness of the narcissistic parent?

Not everything is “parental alienation.”

Sometimes the narcissistic parent is the targeted parent and the child’s avoidance of a relationship with this parent is an authentic child response to the profound failure of parental empathy associated with a narcissistic parent. So that in these cases, the allegation of “parental alienation” made by one parent toward the other is actually a false allegation.

Differentiating True “Parental Alienation” from False Allegations of “Parental Alienation”

How can we differentiate true “parental alienation” from false allegations of “parental alienation?”

The answer is that the full set of the three diagnostic indicators for an attachment-based model of “parental alienation” will NOT be evident in false allegations of “parental alienation,” and the full set of three diagnostic indicators will always be present in true allegations of “parental alienation.”

Attachment System Suppression

The differentiation of the attachment system differences in authentic parent-child conflict from cases of “parental alienation” is subtle but distinctive.

False Allegations of “Parental Alienation” – In authentic parent-child conflict, the child’s “protest behavior” (e.g, angry-oppositional behavior) remains an “attachment-behavior” designed to elicit GREATER parental involvement.

In authentic parent-child conflict, the child still WANTS to form a relationship with the targeted parent but is frustrated and discouraged by some element of the targeted parent’s behavior, such as the chronic failure of parental empathy associated with narcissistic parenting practices. In authentic parent-child conflict the child’s withdrawal from a relationship with the targeted parent reflects the child’s discouragement in achieving an affectionally bonded relationship rather than a rejection of a relationship with the targeted parent.

In cases of authentic parent-child conflict, since the child’s protest behavior and withdrawal from the targeted parent reflect the child’s discouragement in achieving a positive relationship rather than rejection of a relationship, if the behavior of the targeted parent is changed to allow for child bonding then the child’s motivation toward bonding with the parent will achieve completion and the parent-child conflict will resolve.

In authentic parent-child conflict the child’s protest behavior reflects an “attachment behavior” designed to elicit GREATER parental involvement, and the child’s withdrawal from a relationship with the parent reflects DISCOURAGEMENT in forming an affectional bond to the parent, so that if the parenting behaviors are changed to allow an affectional bond to be established, the parent-child conflict will resolve.

True Allegations of “Parental Alienation” – Whereas when the parent-child conflict with the targeted parent is the product of attachment-based “parental alienation,” the child’s protest behavior will represent an inauthentic display as a “detachment behavior” designed to sever the child’s relationship with the parent. The authentic functioning of the attachment system DOES NOT ALLOW child detachment behaviors.

From an evolutionary perspective, children who detached in their bonding to parents fell prey to predators and other environmental dangers, so that genes allowing child detachment behaviors were selectively removed from the collective gene pool. Whereas children who bonded MORE strongly to problematic parents were more likely to acquire parental protection from predators, so that genes motivating INCREASED CHILD BONDING motivation to problematic parents were selectively increased in the gene pool because of the survival advantage that increased child bonding to the problematic parent provided..

This is important to understand about the authentic functioning of the attachment system, children are MORE STRONGLY motivated to bond to problematic parents. Children do NOT reject parents. Children who rejected parents were eaten by predators.

Authentic parent-child conflict is a product of the child’s desire TO FORM an affectional bond to the parent that is being frustrated in some way. When the barrier to the parent-child bonding is removed, the child completes his or her desire to form an affectional bond to the parent and the parent-child conflict is resolved.

In attachment-based “parental alienation,” on the other hand, the child is SEEKING TO SEVER the parent-child bond, so that the child’s protest behavior represents a “detachment behavior.” Child “detachment behaviors” represent an inauthentic display of the attachment system.

There are only a limited number of highly pathogenic circumstances that can override the survival advantage conferred by the parent-child bond so that a termination of the parent-child bond is sought.

  1. Sexual abuse/incest
  2. Prolonged and severe physical abuse of the child (years)
  3. Prolonged and severe domestic violence (years)
  4. Sometimes: chronic prolonged parental alcoholism or severe substance abuse (decades). More often, however, parental alcoholism and substance abuse produces a “parentified child” who adopts a caretaking role toward the parent

In the absence of these specific circumstances in the parent-child relationship, problematic parenting produces an INCREASED child motivation toward bonding with the problematic parent. Authentic child withdrawal from a relationship with a parent represents discouragement, NOT rejection.

Stimulus Control

The clearest way to differentiate authentic from inauthentic parent-child conflict is through the construct of “stimulus control.”

All behavior is elicited by stimuli, or cues. Our driving behavior, for example, is under the “stimulus control” of traffic lights. If the traffic light is red, we stop. If it is green, we go. Yellow is a transitional warning. In addition, our driving behavior is under the stimulus control of painted lines on the road, traffic signs, and our internalized rules for driving. All of these various stimuli control our driving behavior.

Children’s behavior in authentic parent-child conflict is under the “stimulus control” of the parent’s behavior, so that changes in the parent’s behavior will produce corresponding changes in the child’s behavior.

If, however, changes to the parent’s behavior do not produce corresponding changes to the child’s behavior, then the child’s behavior is NOT under the “stimulus control” of the parent’s behavior, meaning that the parent-child conflict is inauthentic.

In attachment-based “parental alienation,” the child’s behavior toward the targeted parent is not under the “stimulus control” of the targeted parent’s behavior.  It doesn’t matter what the targeted parent does or doesn’t do, the child rejects a relationship with this parent. 

In attachment-based “parental alienation,” the locus of “stimulus control” for the child’s behavior toward the targeted-rejected parent is to be found in the cross-generational coalition of the child with the narcissistic/(borderline) parent, and is contained in internalized “rules” the child has acquired through the distorted parenting practices of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent regarding the child’s relationship with the targeted parent, much in the same way that our internalized rules regarding driving act to control our driving behavior.

Differentiating Authentic Versus Inauthentic Conflict

One means of differentiating authentic versus inauthentic parent-child conflict is whether the child’s protest behavior represents an “attachment behavior” designed to increase parental involvement in response to barriers to the child’s ability to form an affectionally bonded relationship with the parent, or whether the child’s protest behavior represents an inauthentic display of “detachment behavior” designed to sever the parent-child relationship.

A second means of differentiating authentic versus inauthentic parent-child conflict is through the construct of “stimulus control.” The child’s behavior in authentic parent-child conflict is under the stimulus control of the parent’s behavior, so that changes in the parent’s behavior produce corresponding changes in the child’s behavior. Whereas in inauthentic parent-child conflict the child’s behavior toward the targeted parent is NOT under the stimulus control of the targeted parent, so that changes to the behavior of the targeted parent DO NOT produce corresponding changes to the child’s behavior.

Personality Disorder Symptoms

This is the clearest set of symptoms for differentiating true allegations of attachment-based “parental alienation” from false allegations of “parental alienation.”

In attachment-based “parental alienation,” the child’s symptomatic rejection of a relationship with the targeted parent is the product of pathogenic parental influence on the child by the narcissistic/(borderline) parent. In influencing the child to reject a relationship with the other parent, the narcissistic/(borderline) parent leaves telltale evidence of his or her pathogenic influence on the child through the narcissistic/borderline features of the child’s attitude toward the targeted-rejected parent.

Children to not spontaneously develop narcissistic and borderline personality traits. The development of narcissistic and borderline personality traits in children can ONLY be produced by the pathogenic parenting practices of a narcissistic or borderline parent. The psychological influence on a child by a narcissistic/(borderline) parent will leave “psychological fingerprint” evidence of this pathogenic influence in the child’s symptom display toward the targeted parent.

The “psychological fingerprint” evidence of distorting pathogenic influence on the child by a narcissistic/(borderline) parent is the presence in the child’s symptom display of five specific narcissistic and borderline features.

In authentic parent-child conflict in which a false allegation of “parental alienation” is made, the child’s symptom display toward the targeted parent WILL NOT display narcissistic and borderline personality features. In particular, the child will not evidence a sense of entitlement relative to the targeted-rejected parent, nor will the child evidence an attitude of haughty and arrogant contempt for the targeted-rejected parent.

In authentic parent-child conflict the child will also typically continue to evidence normal-range empathy for the emotional experience of the targeted parent, although this capacity for empathy may periodically disappear during periods of open anger toward the targeted parent. In authentic parent-child conflict, the child’s capacity for normal-range empathy for the targeted parent will typically be evident during inter-episode periods that occur between openly angry exchanges the child has with the targeted parent.

Also, in authentic parent-child conflicts the psychological dynamic of splitting will not be evident in the child’s symptom display. Spitting is the characteristic tendency for polarized black-and-white thinking in which people and relationships are seen as entirely good and wonderful, or as entirely bad and evil. In authentic parent-child conflict the child will express anger and frustration with the targeted parent, but will not characterize the targeted parent as a polarized extreme of all bad. Instead, during periods when the parent and child are not openly fighting, the child will be able to maintain a nuanced, shades-of-gray, perception of both positive and negative qualities possessed by the targeted parent, even though the child may find some parental qualities frustrating and provoking.

In order for attachment-based “parental alienation” to be diagnosed as being present, ALL FIVE narcissistic and borderline traits MUST be present in the child’s symptom display. The presence of all five narcissistic and borderline traits in the child’s symptom display represents the “psychological fingerprint” evidence for the distorting pathogenic influence on the child by a narcissistic/(borderline) parent.

Since the child is rejecting a relationship with the targeted parent, the psychological influence on the child that is evidenced in the child’s display of narcissistic and borderline personality traits CANNOT be emanating from the targeted parent, since the child is rejecting the influence of this parent. Since narcissistic and borderline personality traits can ONLY emerge as a result of distorting pathogenic parenting practices by a narcissistic/borderline parent, the only possible source for the child’s symptom display of narcissistic and borderline personality traits is the distorted pathogenic parenting practices of the allied and supposedly favored parent.

Sub-Threshold Display

If the child’s symptoms display some but not all of the five narcissistic and borderline personality traits predicted by an attachment-based model of “parental alienation,” then the diagnosis of attachment-based “parental alienation” cannot be made.

In sub-threshold cases in which some but not all of the diagnostic indicators of attachment-based “parental alienation” are present, a 6-month “Response-to-Intervention” (RTI) trial can be initiated, treating the parent-child conflict as if it was authentic. This 6-month RTI trial can clarify diagnostic features in one or the other direction.

If the parent-child conflict is authentic, then six months of treatment should produce substantial improvements in the relationship. If the parent-child conflict is the result of attachment-based “parental alienation,” then six months of treatment will produce no gains, and during the six month RTI trial the additional confirmatory diagnostic indicators should become evident during the course of treatment.

The presence of additional clinical signs (Diagnostic Indicators and Associated Clinical Signs) indicative of attachment-based “parental alienation” may also help confirm diagnostic impressions.

Delusional Beliefs

The third diagnostic indicator of attachment-based “parental alienation,” an intransigently held, fixed and false belief (i.e., a delusion) regarding the supposedly abusive parental inadequacy of the targeted rejected parent, will not be present in authentic parent-child conflicts.

The foundational source of this delusional belief is the reenactment narrative involving attachment trauma networks in the “internal working models,” or “schemas,” of the alienating parent’s attachment system. This process is explained more fully in my online Master Lecture Series seminars on theory and treatment (7/18/14: Theoretical Foundations – 11/21/14: Diagnosis and Treatment) through California Southern University. The child’s delusional belief represents the child’s adopting the “victimized child” role within the trauma reenactment narrative.

This type of trauma reenactment is familiar within the treatment literature related to trauma,

“Reenactments of the traumatic past are common in the treatment of this population and frequently represent either explicit or coded repetitions of the unprocessed trauma in an attempt at mastery. Reenactments can be expressed psychologically, relationally, and somatically and may occur with conscious intent or with little awareness.” (Perlman & Courtois, 2005, p. 455)

“One primary transference-countertransference dynamic involves reenactment of familiar roles of victim, perpetrator–rescuer-bystander in the therapy relationship. Therapist and client play out these roles, often in complementary fashion with one another, as they relive various aspects of the client’s early attachment relationships. (Perlman & Courtois, 2005, p. 455)

Pearlman, C.A., Courtois, C.A. (2005). Clinical Applications of the Attachment Framework: Relational Treatment of Complex Trauma. Journal of Traumatic Stress, 18, 449-459.

In the case of attachment-based “parental alienation” it is the family members who are enacting the various roles of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent’s attachment trauma history, in which the child is enacting the role as the “victimized child,” the targeted parent is enacting the role as the “abusive parent,” and the narcissistic/(borderline) parent is adopting and enacting the coveted role as the “rescuing/protective parent.”

But none of this trauma reenactment narrative is true. The child is not a victim, the targeted parent is not abusive, and the narcissistic/(borderline) parent is not protective. It is a false drama created in the trauma contained in the narcissistic/(borderline) parent’s attachment system.

The child’s delusional belief represented by Diagnostic Indicator 3 is a manifestation of the child having been induced through the distorted pathogenic parenting practices of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent into adopting the “victimized child” role within the false trauma reenactment narrative of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent’s attachment trauma.

So that expert clinical diagnosticians, which should be a requirement for all mental health professionals working with this “special population” of children and families, should look beyond the mere surface features of the child’s delusional beliefs into the surrounding context for signs of the trauma reenactment narrative of which the child’s false belief in the “victimization role” is but one feature.

In authentic parent-child conflict involving false allegations of “parental alienation,” the child’s beliefs regarding the parenting practices of the targeted parent are not delusional. If, for example, the child asserts that the parent is physically abusive, the evidence presented by the child for this belief will be consistent with the child’s expressed belief. So that a child who asserts that the targeted parent is physically abusive should report that this belief is based on repeated incidents of being hit with a belt, or with a fist, or with an electrical cord.

Whether or not these child reports can be substantiated is another matter, but the reports of the child regarding the parenting practices of the parent should be consistent with the child’s beliefs that the parent is physically abusive (in the case of allegations of physically abusive parenting).

This is in contrast to a child who alleges the targeted parent is “emotionally abusive” because the parent took the child’s iphone away as punishment for the child’s hostile and negative attitude and display of disrespect. This is not considered “abusive” parenting, this is considered “discipline” and is entirely within normal-range parenting practices.

In this case, if the child maintains the position that the parent taking the child’s iphone away for a period of time as discipline for inappropriate child behavior represents “emotional abuse” rather than normal-range parenting practice (i.e., “discipline”), then this would suggest the presence of an intransigently held, fixed and false belief in the supposedly abusive parenting practices of a normal range and affectionally available parent, which would be consistent with the child adopting a “victimized child” role.

In authentic parent-child conflicts, such as when the targeted parent is the parent with the narcissistic personality, or in cases of authentically abusive parenting, the child’s beliefs regarding the parenting practices of the targeted parent are not delusional, they are accurate.

Furthermore, in cases where it is the targeted parent who has the narcissistic personality and is making a false allegation of “parental alienation” from an inability to self-reflect and from a charcterological propensity to externalize blame and responsibility, professional clinical interviews with the targeted parent should reveal the presence of narcissistic personality traits.

Prominent among the distinctive clinical indicators of narcissistic personality is the absence of empathy. So in cases of authentic parent-child conflict in which the narcissistic parent is the targeted parent, clinical interviews with the narcissistic targeted parent should be able to reveal this parent’s profound absence of empathy, which then supports the beliefs of the child regarding the problematic parenting practices of the narcissistic targeted parent, so the child’s beliefs again are not delusional but are supported by direct clinical observation.

Diagnosis of Attachment-Based “Parental Alienation”

Not everything is “parental alienation.”

Sometimes the targeted parent is the narcissistic parent and the child’s withdrawal from a relationship with this narcissistic parent is an understandable and reasonable response to the profound absence of parental empathy emanating from the narcissistic parent. Sometimes the allegation of “parental alienation” by a narcissistic parent represents the inability of the narcissistic parent to self-reflect and the narcissistic tendency to externalize blame and responsibility.

Sometimes the child’s withdrawal from a relationship with a parent is the product of actual physical or sexual abuse of the child, or is the product of prolonged and severe domestic violence. In these cases the child’s belief in the abusive parenting practices of the physically or sexually abusive parent are not delusional, they’re true.

However, in these circumstances the child will not display narcissistic personality traits toward the abusive parent. In particular, the child will not display an attitude of haughty and arrogant disrespect and contemptuous disdain toward the physically or sexually abusive parent, nor will the child display a sense of entitlement relative to the abusive parent, in which the child feels entitled to have every desire immediately met by the physically or sexually abusive parent.

Instead, physically and sexually abused children tend to present as timid and submissive in their relationship with the abusive parent, and they may display as angry and aggressive in other settings, such as in peer relationships at school.

Sometimes, however, a narcissistic/(borderline) parent has formed a cross-generational coalition with the child against the other parent, in which the child has been induced into adopting the “victimized child” role in the trauma reenactment narrative of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent, so that the child is induced through the distorted pathogenic parenting practices of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent into rejecting a relationship with a normal-range and affectionally available parent so that the child can be used by the narcissistic/(borderline) parent as a “regulatory object” for this parent’s own emotional and psychological needs.

This process is explained more fully in my online Master Lecture Series seminars on theory and treatment (7/18/14: Theoretical Foundations – 11/21/14: Diagnosis and Treatment) through California Southern University.

So that sometimes the child’s rejection of a relationship with a parent is the product of attachment-based “parental alienation.”

When ALL THREE diagnostic indicators of attachment-based “parental alienation” are present in the child’s symptom display, then a clinical diagnosis of attachment-based “parental alienation” is warranted since NO OTHER PROCESS can produce THIS SPECIFIC SET of child symptoms other than an attachment-based model of “parental alienation.”

Authentic parent-child conflict will not produce this specific symptom set. Authentic child abuse will not produce this specific symptom set. ONLY the processes of an attachment-based model for the construct of “parental alienation” will produce this specific symptom set of three diagnostic indicators (Diagnostic Indicators and Associated Clinical Signs)

Craig Childress, Psy.D.
Clinical Psychologist, PSY 18857

References

Moor, A. and Silvern, L. (2006). Identifying pathways linking child abuse to psychological outcome: The mediating role of perceived parental failure of empathy. Journal of Emotional Abuse, 6, 91-112.

Pearlman, C.A., Courtois, C.A. (2005). Clinical Applications of the Attachment Framework: Relational Treatment of Complex Trauma. Journal of Traumatic Stress, 18, 449-459.

Online Seminar: The Diagnosis & Treatment of Attachment-Based Parental Alienation

My 11/21/14 online seminar regarding the Diagnosis and Treatment of Attachment-Based “Parental Alienation” through the Master Lecture Series of California Southern University is now available online for the general public at:

https://vimeo.com/calsouthern/review/113572265/8d0b48de77

A handout of the Powerpoint slides for this seminar is available on my website: www.drcachildress.org

I believe this seminar is significant in several primary areas:

Standards of Practice: This seminar describes clearly defined standards for professional competence in the diagnosis and treatment of this “special population” of children and families experiencing attachment-based “parental alienation.”

Psychological Child Abuse: It establishes the theoretical foundations and support for identifying attachment-based “parental alienation” as psychological child abuse that warrants the DSM-5 diagnosis of V995.51 Child Psychological Abuse, Confirmed.

Diagnostic Criteria: It defines a set of clear diagnostic criteria based in established and accepted psychological principles and constructs that can reliably identify attachment-based “parental alienation” in every case, and that can reliably differentiate attachment-based “parental alienation” from other forms of parent-child conflict, including false allegations of “parental alienation.”

Protective Separation: It defines the structure necessary for treatment that begins with a protective separation of the child from the pathogenic parenting practices of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent during the active phase of the child’s treatment and recovery.

This online seminar is now available for review by therapists, child custody evaluators, attorneys, judges, and the general media, and so can serve as a referral resource for targeted parents trying to increase general public awareness and the understanding of legal and mental health professionals regarding the issues surrounding an attachment-based model of “parental alienation” and the mental health needs of children and families experiencing this type of tragic family process.

With the proper professional understanding that leads to an appropriate legal and mental health response, the solution to attachment-based “parental alienation” in any individual family circumstance is likely to be achievable within a relatively short period of active treatment intervention.

The family tragedy of “parental alienation” needs to end.  Today.

Every day that passes that we do not enact the required solution is another day that we tolerate the profoundly destructive psychological abuse of the child.

Craig Childress, Psy.D.
Clinical Psychologist, PSY 18857

High Road to Family Reunification

My blog posts have been somewhat quiet recently because I’ve been focused on writing a book regarding the Theory and Diagnosis of an Attachment-Based Model of “Parental Alienation,” and I had to prepare for my recent Master Series seminar through California Southern University regarding the Diagnosis and Treatment of Attachment-Based Parental Alienation.” I was also focused on a Court case in Hawaii that was operating under time pressures.  This case was referred to me through Ms. Dorcy Pruter, a co-parenting and reunification coach at the Conscious Co-Parenting Institute (www.consciouscoparentinginstitute.com)

The Court case had a successful outcome for the targeted-rejected parent, and Ms. Pruter is now handling the mother-daughter reunification process.

I have been aware of Ms. Pruter’s work in this area for a while, but through our work together on this case I have had the opportunity to review Ms. Pruter’s reunification protocol and have also been able to engage her in extensive dialogue regarding her approach and an attachment-based model for the construct of “parental alienation.”

I would like to take this opportunity to provide Ms. Pruter with my unequivocal, full and complete support for her model of family reunification (“High Road to Family Reunification”).  Based on my review of her reunification protocol, it is theoretically sound for addressing the issues surrounding an attachment-based model of “parental alienation.” I would anticipate that her reunification protocol will be highly effective in resolving the family issues surrounding an attachment-based model of “parental alienation.”

One of the primary issues regarding enacting Ms. Pruter’s reunification protocol is that it FIRST requires the child’s protective separation from the distorted parenting practices of the narcissistic/(borderline) allied (and supposedly “favored”) parent. This is, however, not a limitation of her protocol but instead represents an authentic treatment-related need of addressing the pathogenic parenting of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent that is inducing the very serious child psychopathology evidenced in attachment-based “parental alienation.”

In my private practice I will no longer treat cases of attachment-based “parental alienation” without first obtaining the child’s protective separation from the pathogenic parenting of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent because I have become convinced that to do so places the child at risk of psychological harm as a result of being turned into a “psychological battleground” between the efforts of therapy to restore the child’s normal-range, balanced and healthy psychological functioning and the unrelenting efforts of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent to maintain the child’s symptomatic rejection of a relationship with the normal-range and healthy targeted parent.

Turning the child into a psychological battleground between the goals of therapy to restore healthy child development and the pathogenic goals of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent to maintain the child’s symptomatic state runs the considerable risk of harming the child-client’s emotional and psychological development.  So unless the necessary treatment-related conditions exist to allow effective therapy to restore the child’s healthy functioning without risking psychological harm to the child in the process, then I will decline treatment.

In my professional view, based on my professional experience and expertise in this area, professionally responsible and competent treatment of an attachment-based model of “parental alienation” (i.e., the presence in the child’s symptom display of the three Diagnostic Indicators of attachment-based “parental alienation”) REQUIRES that the child FIRST be protectively separated from the pathogenic parenting of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent during the active phase of the child’s treatment and recovery.

Once the child’s healthy and normal-range functioning has been restored and the child’s healthy and normal-range relationship with the formerly targeted-rejected parent has been recovered, then the pathogenic parenting of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent can be reintroduced under appropriate therapeutic monitoring of the child’s symptoms that ensures that the child’s symptoms do not return upon the reintroduction of the pathogenic parenting of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent (there are treatment-related steps that can be taken to reduce this risk).

In first requiring the child’s protective separation from the pathogenic parenting of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent, Ms. Pruter’s protocol (the “High Road to Family Reunification”) demonstrates its accurate understanding for the family dynamics involved.

Furthermore, Ms. Pruter’s reunification protocol is solution-focused and avoids criticism of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent, thereby respecting the child’s love for BOTH parents, even for the narcissistic/(borderline) parent.  The fundamental issue for the child is his or her TRIANGULATION into the spousal conflict through the efforts of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent that enlist the child in a cross-generational coalition against the other parent.

In avoiding criticism of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent, Ms. Pruter’s reunification protocol represents an appropriate response to the child’s triangulation into the spousal conflict by allowing the child to be de-triangulated from the spousal conflict.  The child does not need to take sides.  I’m sure this is a great relief to the child.

In addition, her protocol is psycho-educational in focus, so that it effectively brings cognitive mediation to emotional processes, thereby lessening the child’s hyper-inflamed emotional distortions toward the targeted parent.  The educational material also provides the child with a healthy and balanced narrative for understanding the family experience without blame for anyone, including without guilt for the child stemming from the child’s prior distorted-hostile-rejecting behavior toward the targeted parent.

Ms. Pruter’s reunification protocol elegantly provides the child with a narrative road out of the hostile-rejecting behavior toward the targeted-rejected parent while simultaneously de-triangulating the child from the spousal conflict.

Ms. Pruter claims she has experienced substantial (universal) success with her protocol in reunifying parent-child relationships, and after my review of her protocol I would similarly expect it to be fully successful based upon its structure and approach.

Ms. Pruter’s protocol also has a component for the participation of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent in learning the skills needed to avoid triangulating the child into the spousal conflict, which also recommends this protocol as a complete family intervention.  Although Ms. Pruter notes from her experience that participation by the narcissistic/(borderline) parent is irregular at best.

One of the limitations of Ms. Pruter’s reunification protocol is that it is offered in an intensive four-day initial intervention with subsequent follow-up to stabilize the reunited parent-child relationship, which places this protocol beyond the reach of many families that live in other parts of the country or who may have limited financial resources.  I am currently in discussion with Ms. Pruter on ways to possibly make training in this reunification protocol available to mental health therapists via online training seminars so as to make this approach more broadly available to targeted-rejected parents and their children.

Another limitation is that the protocol (appropriately) requires that the child be protectively separated from the pathogenic parenting of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent during the active phase of the child’s treatment and recovery.  While this is both a necessary and professionally responsible requirement, it will require the cooperation of the Court, which is a hurdle that targeted-rejected parents will need to address and overcome before this protocol becomes available for restoring their relationships with their children that have been so severely damaged by the pathogenic parenting of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent.

Yet even with these barriers to enacting the protocol, I am heartened and optimistic in reviewing a reunification protocol that is both thoughtfully integrated and elegant in its formulation, and that is theoretically sound for addressing and resolving the family dynamics associated with an attachment-based model of “parental alienation.”

Craig Childress, Psy.D.
Clinical Psychologist, PSY 18857

Powerpoint Slides from Master Lecture Series Presentation

This morning I provided an online seminar through the Master Lecture Series of California Southern University regarding the Diagnosis and Treatment of an attachment-based model of “parental alienation.”  The seminar seems to have been well-received.

This online seminar was recorded and will become available online in about one week through the Master Lecture Series of California Southern University.  Both this seminar on Diagnosis and Treatment, and the earlier companion seminar I delivered in July of 2014 through the Master Lecture Series regarding the Theoretical Foundations of an attachment-based model of “parental alienation” will then be available online to mental health professionals, and as importantly, as a resource for targeted parents to refer treating mental health professionals for further information about an attachment-based model of “parental alienation.”

I have posted a handout of my Powerpoint slides for today’s seminar to my website.  Of particular note is my discussion beginning on page 15 of the handout regarding children and families evidencing the diagnostic indicators of attachment-based “parental alienation” as representing a “special population” requiring specialized professional knowledge, training, and expertise to appropriately and competently diagnose and treat. 

Failure to possess the specialized professional knowledge, training, and expertise necessary for professional competence in diagnosing and treating this “special population” of children and family issues likely represents practice beyond the boundaries of professional competence in violation of professional practice standards (Standard 2.02 of the Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct of the American Psychological Association (2002).

It is long past overdue to expect and demand professional competence from mental health professionals with regard to diagnosing and treating the severe psychopathology associated with an attachment-based model of “parental alienation.”

Also of note from this seminar is my discussion of the pathogenic parenting associated with an attachment-based model of “parental alienation” as representing a DSM-5 diagnosis of V995.51 Child Psychological Abuse, Confirmed.  The presence in the child’s symptom display of the three definitive Diagnostic Indicators of an attachment-based model of “parental alienation” shifts the issue from one of child custody and visitation to one of child protection.

Attachment-based “parental alienation” is not a child custody issue; it is a child protection issue.

Craig Childress, Psy.D.
Clinical Psychologist, PSY 18857

Online Seminar on Diagnosis and Treatment

On November 21, 2014 from 10:00-12:00 Pacific Standard Time I will be presenting an online seminar through the Masters Lecture Series of California Southern University regarding the Diagnosis and Treatment of an attachment-based model for “parental alienation.”  

This seminar is offered free to the general public and the seminar will be recorded and made available online through California Southern University’s Master Lecture Series for later viewing.

Registration for this online seminar regarding the Diagnosis and Treatment of attachment-based “parental alienation” is at:

http://www.calsouthern.edu/content/events/treatment-of-attachment-based-parental-alienation/

This Diagnosis and Treatment seminar is a follow-up to my earlier online seminar regarding the Theoretical Foundations for an attachment-based model of “parental alienation” that I delivered on July 18 through the Masters Lecture Series of California Southern University, and which is currently available at:

http://www.calsouthern.edu/content/events/parental-alienation-an-attachment-based-model/

My hope is that these two companion seminars will provide foundational information for mental health professionals in understanding, diagnosing, and treating the family dynamics associated with “parental alienation,” so that these seminars can serve as a resource to which targeted parents can refer diagnosing and treating mental health professionals to improve their understanding for the issues involved.

An attachment-based model for the construct of “parental alienation” is based entirely within standard and established psychological principles and constructs.  Within the field of mental health, all of these constructs are fully recognized and fully accepted psychological principles and constructs.

The family systems constructs of the child’s triangulation into the spousal conflict through the formation of a cross-generational coalition of the child with one parent against the other parent is an established psychological principle within family systems therapy (Haley, 1977; Munichin, 1974).  Minuchin refers to this cross-generational coalition as a “rigid triangle,” Haley refers to it as a “perverse triangle.”

“The rigid triangle can also take the form of a stable coalition. One of the parents joins the child in a rigidly bounded cross-generational coalition against the other parent.” (Minuchin, 1974, p. 102)

“The people responding to each other in the triangle are not peers, but one of them is of a different generation from the other two… In the process of their interaction together, the person of one generation forms a coalition with the person of the other generation against his peer. By ‘coalition’ is meant a process of joint action which is against the third person… The coalition between the two persons is denied. That is, there is certain behavior which indicates a coalition which, when it is queried, will be denied as a coalition… In essence, the perverse triangle is one in which the separation of generations is breached in a covert way. When this occurs as a repetitive pattern, the system will be pathological. (Haley, 1977, p. 37)

Narcissistic and borderline personality disorder processes are recognized forms of pathology within the DSM diagnostic system (American Psychiatric Association, 2013) and are fully elaborated and described by preeminent theorists in professional psychology (e.g., Beck, et. al. 2004; Kernberg, 1977; Linehan, 1993; Millon, 2011).

The attachment system is a well-established and accepted psychological construct within professional psychology, with substantial theoretical foundation and research support (Ainsworth, 1989; Bowlby, 1969; 1973; 1980; Bretherton, 1992).

There is nothing new or controversial in any of these psychological principles or constructs.  They are all established and accepted psychological principles and constructs with which all mental health professionals should be familiar as a matter of professional competence, particularly if they are diagnosing and treating issues involving a child’s triangulation into the spousal conflict through a cross-generational coalition of the child with a narcissistic/(borderline) parent that results in the induced suppression of the normal-range functioning of the child’s attachment system.

While targeted parents do not possess the professional background, training, and expertise in professional psychology to explain to the mental health professionals involved with their families the application of these established psychological principles and constructs , I do. 

In these two online seminars I explain to other mental health professionals the application of these accepted psychological principles and constructs to the family processes traditionally described as “parental alienation.”  Hopefully this professional-level dialogue can begin to shift the mental health community into greater professional expertise and responsiveness to the needs of targeted parents and their children that will be necessary if we are to resolve the family tragedy of “parental alienation” for all families in all cases.

Craig Childress, Psy.D.
Clinical Psychologist, PSY 18857

References

Family Systems:

Haley, J. (1977). Toward a theory of pathological systems. In P. Watzlawick & J. Weakland (Eds.), The interactional view (pp. 31-48). New York: Norton.

Minuchin, S. (1974). Families and Family Therapy. Harvard University Press.

Personality Disorders:

American Psychiatric Association. (2013). Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders (5th ed.). Washington, DC: Author.

Beck, A.T., Freeman, A., Davis, D.D., & Associates (2004). Cognitive therapy of personality disorders. (2nd edition). New York: Guilford.

Kernberg, O.F. (1975). Borderline conditions and pathological narcissism.. New York: Aronson.

Linehan, M. M. (1993). Cognitive-behavioral treatment of borderline personality disorder.  New York, NY: Guilford

Millon. T. (2011). Disorders of personality: introducing a DSM/ICD spectrum from normal to abnormal. Hoboken: Wiley.  

Attachment System:

Ainsworth, M.D.S. (1989). Attachments beyond infancy. American Psychologist, 44, 709-716.

Bowlby, J. (1969). Attachment and loss. Attachment, Vol. 1. NY: Basic Books.

Bowlby, J. (1973). Attachment and loss: Vol. 2. Separation: Anxiety and anger. NY: Basic Books.

Bowlby, J. (1980). Attachment and loss: Vol. 3. Loss: Sadness and depression. NY: Basic Books.

Bretherton, I. (1992). The origins of attachment theory: John Bowlby and Mary Ainsworth. Developmental Psychology, 1992, 28, 759-775.

The Solution

Any solution to “parental alienation” that requires that we prove “parental alienation” in Court is a failure.

1.  Financially Prohibitive: Proving “parental alienation” in Court is simply too expensive for the vast majority of targeted-rejected parents. The financial costs associated with proving “parental alienation” in Court places it beyond the means of 95% of targeted-rejected parents.

 Any solution that requires proving “parental alienation” in Court is only a solution for 5% of targeted-rejected parents. This is no solution.

2.  Requires Egregious Displays of Alienation: Proving “parental alienation” in Court is only possible in the most egregious cases of alienation. The more subtle cases of insidious alienation are nearly impossible to prove in Court.

Any solution that requires proving “parental alienation” in Court is only a solution for the limited number of targeted-parents who have sufficient financial resources and only in the most egregious cases. So now we’re down to 1-2% of the cases of “parental alienation.”

While proving “parental alienation” in Court may seem like a solution to professionals who work within the Court system. For those of us who work in the daily lives of people who cannot financially afford attorneys and child custody evaluations, it is no solution at all.

3.  Robbing the Child: The high financial costs of fighting “parental alienation” in Court robs the child of what should be his or her college education fund. Every dollar paid to an attorney or child custody evaluator harms the child by taking money from the child that should be going to his or her college education.

Any solution that requires proving “parental alienation” in Court harms the child by draining financial resources from the family that should be going toward the child.

4.  Too Slow: Proving “parental alienation” in Court can often take years of protracted legal battles.  During this time, important child developmental phases come and go, and are lost forever.  Lost childhood can never be reclaimed.  A mother only has 365 days of her child being 8 years old, that’s it.  And not a single lost day can ever be reclaimed.  A father only has a brief time with daddy’s little girl, with his princess. Once lost, this time never returns.

Years to enact a solution is simply too long.  Months are too long a timeframe.  Any solution to “parental alienation” should be able to be enacted within weeks in the life of the child. If we require months, so be it, but definitely not years.

Any solution that requires proving “parental alienation” in Court irrevocably harms the child by robbing the child of important and irretrievable developmental phases and experiences with a loving and affectionally available parent. It simply takes too long.

Of note is that I recently had the opportunity for a conversation with Ms. Dorcy Pruter (http://www.consciouscoparentinginstitute.com).  During our conversation she said she can enact the child’s restoration with the targeted-rejected parent in a matter of days, once the Court orders a protective separation of the child from the alienating parent, and based on my initial review of her approach during our conversation I suspect her treatment model can accomplish what she claims for it.  Just to be generous, I’ll give her some leeway and say weeks rather than days (yet days makes sense to me based on her description of the model), but the point is, in a very short time frame. Her approach seemingly has the proper components to accomplish what she claims for it.

Once we achieve a protective separation of the child from the ongoing pathogenic parenting of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent, restoration of a normal-range and affectionally bonded relationship with the targeted-rejected parent is relatively straightforward because we are working WITH the normal-range functioning of the child’s own attachment system.  The child’s authentic brain WANTS to bond to the targeted-rejected parent.  We just need to provide the setting, structure, and guidance to allow the child’s natural attachment bonding motivations to achieve completion. 

Once the child’s attachment bonding motivations are able to achieve completion, the child’s (misinterpreted) grief response resolves, and the impact on the child of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent’s distorted and pathogenic parenting practices is eliminated.  We have recovered the authentic child.  We then take steps to build the child’s “psychological immune system” relative to the pathogenic parenting of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent and then we can begin to restore the child’s relationship with the narcissistic/(borderline) parent.

If the narcissistic/(borderline) parent cooperates with the treatment process, that would be wonderful.  If not, then we need to take steps to ensure the child’s ongoing stability and balance in response to the narcissistic/(borderline) parent’s continuing pathogenic parenting.

The Solution

Any solution to “parental alienation” that requires that we prove “parental alienation” in Court is no solution at all because of the immense financial barriers, legal hurdles, and inherent harm to the child’s normal-range developmental trajectory associated with the long and arduous task of trying to prove “parental alienation” in Court.

An attachment-based model of “parental alienation” provides a solution. Once the paradigm shifts away from a Gardnerian PAS model to an attachment-based model, the solution becomes available immediately.

Phase 1

An attachment-based model of “parental alienation” immediately identifies a set of standards of practice for professional competence involving an advanced level of professional understanding for the attachment system (and intersubjective system), and a professionally advanced level of understanding for narcissistic/borderline personality dynamics, their characteristic displays, their underlying dynamics, and processes of their manifestation in family relationships.

Once the paradigm shifts to an attachment-based model of “parental alienation” these children and families become immediately identified as a “special population” requiring specialized professional knowledge, training, and expertise to diagnose and treat.

Phase 2

Once professional practice in this specialty field is limited to a qualified set of highly trained and knowledgeable experts, the diagnosis of pathogenic parenting associated with an attachment-based model of “parental alienation” is established in a clearly defined set of three Diagnostic Indicators (see Diagnostic Indicators and Associated Clinical Signs post), supported by an additional set of confirming clinical signs.

This set of three clearly defined and dichotomous (i.e., present or absent) Diagnostic Indicators has a corresponding DSM-5 diagnosis of:

309.4  Adjustment Disorder with mixed disturbance of emotions and conduct

V61.20 Parent-Child Relational Problem

V61.29 Child Affected by Parental Relationship Distress

V995.51 Child Psychological Abuse, Confirmed

(for an analysis of the DSM-5 diagnosis of an attachment-based model of “parental alienation” see “Childress, 2013: DSM-5 Diagnosis of ‘Parental Alienation’ Processes” on my website)

Phase 3

All specialized experts in High-Conflict Family Divorce (HCFD specialty practice) will make the same DSM-5 diagnosis in response to the identifiable set of three clearly defined and dichotomous (present-absent) Diagnostic Indicators of attachment-based “parental alienation” (i.e., pathogenic parenting). 

This means that all HCFD specialty psychologists will make a DSM-5 diagnosis of V995.51 Child Psychological Abuse, Confirmed.

Phase 4

In making the DSM-5 diagnosis of V995.51 Child Psychological Abuse, Confirmed, these HCFD specialty psychologists then engage a professional responsibility to take protective action for the child.  Chief among these protective steps, and an option that I strongly urge them to enact, is to make a child abuse report to Child Protective Services (CPS) regarding their diagnosis of Child Psychological Abuse, Confirmed.

Phase 5

CPS workers will initially not know how to deal with the influx of child abuse reports by this group of specialist psychologists who are providing a DSM-5 diagnosis of v995.51 Child Psychological Abuse, Confirmed along with their report.  CPS agencies will have one of three possible options,

1.  Ignore the reports (which is an unlikely response, especially as these reports continue to come in)

2.  Accept the DSM-5 diagnosis of the HCFD specialist and remove the child from the custody of the alienating (pathogenic) parent and place the child in the custody of the targeted, normal range and healthy parent (i;e;, engage a protective separation of the child from the psychopathology and pathogenic parenting practices of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent).

3.  Conduct their own investigation of possible child psychological abuse.

I suspect that CPS agencies will choose option 3. 

In the context of having a clinical psychologist who is expert in High-Conflict Family Divorce provide a confirmed DSM-5 diagnosis of Child Psychological Abuse, if the CPS system wants to conduct their own investigation then they will need to obtain similar training in the assessment of an attachment-based model of “parental alienation” upon which the psychologist’s diagnosis is based (i.e., CPS case workers will need to develop professional competence in the specialty practice area of identifying child psychological abuse that occurs within high-conflict family divorce settings) since this knowledge base serves as the foundation for the diagnosis of V995.51 Child Psychological Abuse, Confirmed made by the HCFD specialist psychologist.

So ALL CPS workers everywhere will receive training in an attachment-based model of “parental alienation” and the three definitive diagnostic indicators of pathogenic parenting associated with the child’s cross-generational coalition with a narcissistic/(borderline) parent against the other parent that is inducing significant developmental (Diagnostic Indicator 1), personality (Diagnostic Indicator 2), and psychiatric (Diagnostic Indicator 3) pathology in the child.

Phase 6

The Diagnostic Indicators for attachment-based “parental alienation” are clearly defined and dichotomous, either attachment-based “parental alienation” is present or absent.  Once CPS has a set of clearly defined dichotomous criteria by which to identify pathogenic parenting associated with an attachment-based model of “parental alienation,” they will become empowered and confident in removing the child from the care of pathogenic narcissistic/(borderline) parent in every case where the three Diagnostic Indicators are present.

The Solution

Once a case of pathogenic parenting associated with an attachment-based model of “parental alienation” enters the specialty practice of an HCFD specialist psychologist, a child abuse report will be filed with CPS that includes the psychologist’s diagnosis of V995.51 Child Psychological Abuse, Confirmed.  Once the report enters the CPS system, the CPS case worker will confirm the presence of the three Diagnostic Indicators of pathogenic parenting and will confirm the DSM-5 diagnosis of V995.51 Child Psychological Abuse, Confirmed, so that the diagnosis has now been confirmed by two independent assessments of mental health professionals expert in the family processes associated with high-conflict divorce.

CPS will then immediately remove the child from the custody of the alienating narcissistic/(borderline) parent (i.e., a protective separation of the child from the psychopathology of the pathogenic parent) and place the child with the normal-range and healthy targeted parent to allow for the treatment and resolution of the child’s symptoms.

This establishes the necessary protective separation conditions for a Pruter-style model of treatment that resolves the child’s symptoms within days or weeks.  Once the child’s symptoms have been resolved under the treatment guidance of an HCFD specialist psychologist, the child’s own “psychological immune system” can be strengthened to resist “reinfection” by the distorting pathology of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent, and the child’s relationship with the narcissistic/(borderline) parent can be reestablished.

Of note is that Ms. Pruter also indicated that she has a treatment protocol component for the alienating parent to complete as a requirement for their “reunification therapy” with the child.

This solution never enters the Court system.

It provides an immediate protective separation of the child from the psychopathology of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent.

It solves the family conflict in a matter of weeks and so restores the child to a normal-range developmental trajectory quickly.

It is relatively cost free to the parent so that it does not require an extensive parental financial investment of funds that should be allocated to the child’s future college education.

This is the solution.

If the case does enter the Court system, the judge can order a Treatment Needs Assessment report, which would be a targeted assessment by an HCFD specialist for the presence or absence of the three Diagnostic Indicators of pathogenic parenting associated with an attachment-based model of “parental alienation.”  The targeted Treatment Needs Assessment would be focused and so less extensive than a full child custody evaluation.  Since all child custody evaluators would have become HCFD specialists, this could be a secondary professional service available from them.

My estimate of a Treatment Needs Assessment is that it could be completed in four to six weeks and could provide a clear directive to the Court regarding the treatment needs of the child. If the three Diagnostic Indicators of pathogenic parenting associated with an attachment-based model of “parental alienation” are present, then the HCFD specialist psychologist conducting the assessment would make the appropriate DSM-5 diagnosis of the child (relative to the issue of pathogenic parenting) which would include the DSM-5 diagnosis of V995.51 Child Psychological Abuse, Confirmed.

Upon receiving the report from the HCFD psychologist that contains the DSM-5 diagnosis of V995.51 Child Psychological Abuse, Confirmed, the judge could order removal of the child from the custody of the narcissistic/(borderline) parent and placement of the child with the targeted, normal-range and healthy parent during the active phase of the child’s treatment and recovery.  Under the guidance of an HCFD specialty psychologist, the child and targeted parent could receive a Pruter-style treatment protocol that would restore their relationship within weeks, followed by building the child’s “psychological immune system” response to the distorted pathogenic parenting practices of the narcissistic/(borderline) parenting, culminating in “reunification therapy” between the child and the narcissistic/(borderline) parent.

This is the solution.

Enacting the Solution

I have created the solution.  All the dominoes are in line, and through my writings on my website and blog I have tipped the first domino.  In my view, it is just a matter of time now.

My estimate is the change in paradigm will take about 10 years.  The solution I have enacted has no natural allies.  Establishment mental health has little to no interest in “parental alienation.”  Their interest tends toward Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder and the typical types of parent-child conflict.  “Parental alienation” isn’t really on their radar.  They are likely to simply equate an attachment-based model of “parental alienation” with the Gardnerian PAS model as being “controversial” (when actually an attachment-based model is not at all controversial – all of the constructs are standard and accepted psychological principles and constructs).

The Gardnerian PAS experts are likely to be reluctant to see the end of their favored paradigm for conceptualizing “parental alienation” because they have fought for it for so long and hard.  To see it simply disappear and be replaced by a new paradigm about which they are entirely unfamiliar will likely be hard for them. The Gardnerian PAS experts are likely to simply ignore an attachment-based model and to continue their efforts to seek Court-based solutions for the PAS model.

So an attachment-based paradigm for “parental alienation” will probably languish in obscurity for a while.  Eventually it will get picked up (for a variety of reasons, one of the primary reasons will be its promise for guiding future research efforts).  It will likely become established through the efforts of a new generation of psychologists and mental health professionals who will see the value in a paradigm shift because they have no prior attachment to the PAS model.  They will have an easier time letting go of the PAS model and adopting a new paradigm for describing and understanding “parental alienation” processes.

Eventually the paradigm will shift.  The moment it does the other dominoes will begin to fall.  There is actually a line of dominoes that will also begin to fall that will solve the issue of false allegations of child abuse that are such a troubling part of “parental alienation,” but I’ll leave a description of that line of dominoes for another post.

It’s just a matter of time.

Craig Childress, Psy.D.
Clinical Psychologist, PSY 18857

All that Glitters…

In an attachment-based framework for understanding “parental alienation,” the child appears to present an emotionally bonded relationship with the allied and supposedly “favored” parent while rejecting a relationship with the other parent, allegedly because of problematic parenting practices by this other parent.

However, the display of an emotionally bonded relationship with the allied and supposedly “favored” parent actually represents a false presentation.  A professional level of understanding for how the attachment system works reveals that this apparent display of a bonded relationship actually represents the expected pattern associated with an insecure anxious-ambivalent attachment bond to the supposedly favored and allied parent.

Patterns of Attachment

Many people unfamiliar with the attachment system, including a great many mental health professionals who are ignorant of how the attachment system functions, believe that attachment is only relevant to early childhood bonding. This belief is entirely wrong. The basic patterns of attachment expectations (called “internal working models” by Bowlby and “schemas” by Beck) form during early childhood, but these patterns are used throughout the lifespan.

“Attachment behavior is in no way confined to children.  Although usually less readily aroused, we see it also in adolescents and adults of both sexes whenever they are anxious or under stress.” (Bowlby, 1980, p. 4)

The analogy would be to the language system. The basic grammar of language is acquired during early childhood, but language is then used throughout the lifespan to mediate social relationships.

Similarly, the basic “grammar” of the attachment system, the “internal working models” of attachment relationships, forms during early childhood, but then this “grammar” of the attachment system is used throughout the lifespan to mediate closely bonded relationships, including the marital relationship (Feeney & Noller, 1990; Hazan & Shaver, 1987; Roisman, Madsen, Hennighousen, Sroufe, & Collins, 2001; Simpson, 1990) and the child’s future relationships with his or her own children (Benoit & Parker, 1994; Bretherton, 1990; Fonagy, Steele, & Steele, 1991; Fonagy & Target, 2005; Jacobvitz, Morgan, Kretchmar & Morgan, 1991; Macfie, McElwain, Houts, and Cox, 2005; van Ijzendoorn, 1992).

The child’s bonding with parents is directly mediated by the attachment system.  Any display or disruption of the child’s bonding with parents, such as the overly close emotional bond the child has with the allied and supposedly “favored” parent and the child’s rejection of a relationship with the other parent, the targeted parent, are mediated by the child’s attachment system. Therefore, any professional assessment of the family dynamics involving these attachment-mediated relationships REQUIRES a professional level of understanding for how the attachment system functions and for its characteristic patterns of dysfunctioning in response to problematic parenting.

Failure to possess a professional level of understanding for how the attachment system functions and its characteristic patterns of dysfunctioning when diagnosing and treating such clearly evident disruptions to the child’s attachment system as are reflected in the child’s rejection of a relationship with one parent while seeking primary bonding to an allied and supposedly “favored” parent would be analogous to a physician diagnosing and treating cancer without possessing a professional level of knowledge of what cancer is and what the various forms of cancer are.

Physicians who don’t know what cancer is shouldn’t diagnose and treat cancer.  Psychologists who don’t understand the attachment system, including the characteristic features of its functioning and the characteristic patterns of its dysfunctioning, should NOT be diagnosing and treating disruptions to the child’s attachment bonding motivations.

This would seem self-evident, and it is REQUIRED by professional practice standards,

Standard 2.01a of the Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct addresses Boundaries of Competence and states, “Psychologists provide services, teach and conduct research with populations and in areas only within the boundaries of their competence, based on their education, training, supervised experience, consultation, study or professional experience.”

Diagnosing and treating disruptions to the child’s attachment bonding motivations without possessing a professional level of understanding for what the attachment system is, how it functions, and its characteristic patterns of dysfunctioning would seem to represent practice beyond the boundaries of professional competence in violation of professional practice standards.

Secure Attachment Pattern

In a secure attachment, the child engages in relaxed exploratory behavior of venturing away from the parent to whom the child is securely attached. Periodically, the child will psychologically check back in with the parent to whom the child is securely attached, which is called “emotional recharging,” before once again engaging in exploratory behavior away from this parent.

In a pattern of secure attachment with a favored parent following the divorce, the child would enjoy the care and comfort of the favored parent but would also feel comfortable in engaging in the exploratory behavior of establishing an independent relationship with the other parent as well.

This is important to understand: A SECURE attachment to a bonded parent would be evidenced in the child’s comfort in separating from the bonded parent to form a relationship with the other parent as well.

Insecure (Anxious-Ambivalent) Attachment

In an insecure attachment to a parent, the child is preoccupied with bonding to the parent and expresses a high degree of reluctance to separate from the parent with whom the child is insecurely attached.

In an insecure anxious-ambivalent attachment style, also called a “preoccupied” attachment pattern, the child is hyper-focused on the child’s relationship with the insecurely attached parent and the child is reluctant to engage in normal-range exploratory behavior away from the parent.

Origins of these Patterns

This set of patterns becomes clear when we consider the origins of these attachment patterns.

The evolutionary origins of the attachment system is in the selective predation of children. The attachment system strongly motivates children’s bonding to parents in order to obtain parental protection from predators.

“The biological function of this behavior [i.e., attachment] is postulated to be protection, especially protection from predators.” (Bowlby, 1980, p. 3)

Children who are secure in their attachment bond to the parent feel sufficiently safe and protected to be comfortable engaging in exploratory behavior away from the parent, secure in their relationship with the parent.

Children who are insecure in their attachment bond to their parent become vulnerable to predation, so that the child’s attachment system motivates the child to become preoccupied on maintaining proximity to the parent to whom the child is insecurely attached, so that the child does NOT display normal-range exploratory behavior away from the parent.

Anxious-Ambivalent (Preoccupied) Attachment

In an insecure anxious-ambivalent attachment pattern the child may evidence a hyper-bonding motivation of seeking continual parental involvement through the child’s dependent and clingy behavior.  To those unfamiliar with the characteristic displays of secure and insecure attachment, the child’s dependent preoccupation on the parent may appear to represent a bonded parent-child relationship, when in actuality the child’s hyper-bonding focus on the parent represents a symptom of pathology in the parent-child relationship.

The formation of an insecure anxious-ambivalent (preoccupied) attachment is associated with inconsistent parental availability. 

In attachment-based “parental alienation” this inconsistent parental availability stems from the (hostile) rejection of the child by the narcissistic/(borderline) parent whenever the child evidences bonding motivations toward the other parent, and corresponding indulgent parental involvement whenever the child seeks to avoid the other parent.

The inconsistency of the conditional love offered by the narcissistic/(borderline) parent that is contingent on the child’s rejection of the other parent creates an insecure anxious-ambivalent attachment bond to the narcissistic/borderline parent that produces both the child’s preoccupied focus on maintaining the child’s relationship with the inconsistently available narcissistic/(borderline) parent, and the child’s expressed reluctance to separate from this parent to engage in normal-range exploratory behavior of forming an independent relationship with the other parent for fear of losing the insecurely attached relationship bond with the narcissistic/borderline parent.

What on the surface may appear to be a bonded relationship with the allied and supposedly “favored” parent actually represents a symptomatic expression of an INSECURE attachment bond to this parent.

Bonding to a Problematic Parent

The attachment system is a “goal corrected” motivational system, which means that when parenting is problematic and does not allow the child to form a secure attachment bond, the child nevertheless maintains the goal of forming an attachment bond to the problematic parent so that the child’s behaviors become distorted in an effort to achieve the goal of establishing an attachment bond in the context of the problematic parenting behavior.

“All seven of these MM monkeys [i.e., monkeys raised without mothers] were totally inadequate mothers… Initially, the MM monkeys tended to ignore or withdraw from their babies even when the infants were disengaged and screaming… Later the motherless monkeys ignored, rejected, and were physically abusive to their infants. A surprising phenomena was the universally persisting attempts by the infants to attach to the mother’s body regardless of neglect or physical punishment. When the infants failed to attach to the ventral surface of the mother, they would cling to the dorsal surface and attempt to move to the mother’s ventral surface. (Seay, Alexander, & Harlow, 1964, p. 353)

The distortions to the child’s behavior that result from the child’s ongoing efforts to achieve the goal of establishing an attached relationship with the parent in the context of the parent’s problematic parenting practices result in characteristic patterns of child behavior reflecting insecure attachment to the parent.

Children do NOT seek to sever a relationship with a problematic parent. 

Problematic parenting exposes the child to increased survival risk from predation and other environmental dangers.  Problematic parenting produces an INSECURE attachment, and the child actually becomes MORE STRONGLY motivated to bond to the problematic parent, producing the characteristic patterns of insecure attachment bonding.

Children who severed their relationship to problematic parents were exposed to increased predation and other environmental dangers.  These children died.

Children who became MORE STRONGLY motivated to bond to problematic parents had a higher likelihood of continuing to receive parental protection from predators.  These children survived.

“The paradoxical finding that the more punishment a juvenile receives the stronger becomes its attachment to the punishing figure, very difficult to explain in any other theory, is compatible with the view that the function of attachment behavior is protection from predators (Bowlby, 1969, pp. 226-227)

Over millions of years of evolution involving the selective predation of children, the attachment system developed a motivational response to problematic parenting that is “goal corrected” in which children become MORE STRONGLY motivated to bond to problematic parents.

“A potential evolutionary explanation suggests selection pressures supported infants that remained attached because it increased the probability of survival. From an adaptive point of view, perhaps it is better for an altricial animal to remain attached to an abusive caregiver than receive no care. (Raineki, Moriceau, & Sullivan, 2010, p. 1143)

Children do NOT seek to sever the attachment bond in response to problematic parenting. 

Instead, children become MORE highly motivated to form an attachment bond to the problematic parent. 

In attachment-based “parental alienation” the child is expressing a hyper-bonding motivation toward the allied and supposedly “favored” parent.  This, in itself, suggests that it is the parenting practices of the allied and supposedly “favored” parent that are problematic and so are provoking the child’s hyper-bonding motivation from an insecure attachment created by the problematic parenting of the allied and supposedly “favored” parent.

Attachment-Based “Parental Alienation”

The behavioral display in attachment-based “parental alienation” is that the child is preoccupied with maintaining continual proximity (i.e., full custody) to the allied and supposedly “favored” parent while rejecting normal-range exploratory behavior of establishing an independent relationship with the other parent.

This is the expected child behavioral display associated with an INSECURE anxious-ambivalent (preoccupied) attachment to the allied and supposedly “favored” parent.

So while it may superficially appear that the child is in a bonded relationship with the allied and supposedly “favored” parent, this relationship is actually a symptomatic expression of pathology.

All that glitters…

It is crucial that mental health professionals who are diagnosing and treating disruptions to children’s attachment bonding motivations, including and especially child custody evaluators, have a professional level of knowledge and expertise in the attachment system, its nature, its features, and its characteristic patterns of functioning and dysfunctioning.

Failure to possess a professional level of knowledge and expertise regarding the attachment system when diagnosing and treating a disruption to the child’s attachment system very likely represents practice beyond the boundaries of professional competence in violation of professional practice standards.

Craig Childress, Psy.D.
Clinical Psychologist, PSY 18857

References

Attachment

Bowlby, J. (1969). Attachment and loss:  Vol. 1, Attachment. NY: Basic Books.

Bowlby, J. (1980). Attachment and loss: Vol. 3. Loss: Sadness and depression. NY: Basic Books.

Raineki, C., Moriceau, S., Sullivan, R.M. (2010). Developing a neurobehavioral animal model of infant attachment to an abusive caregiver. Biological Psychiatry, 67, 1137-1145.

Seay, B. Alexander, B.K., and Harlow, H.F. (1964). Maternal behavior of socially deprived rhesus monkeys. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 69, 345-354

Attachment & the Marital Relationship

Feeney, J.A. and Noller, P. (1990). Attachment style as a predictor of adult romantic relationships. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 58, 281-291.

Hazan, C, and Shaver, P. (1987). Romantic love conceptualized as an attachment process. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 52, 511-524.

Roisman, G.I., Madsen, K.H., Hennighousen, L. Sroufe, L.A., and Collins, W.A. (2001). The coherence of dyadic behavior across parent-child and romantic relationships as mediated by the internalized representation of experience. Attachment and Human Behavior, 3, 156-172.

Simpson, J.A. (1990). Influence of attachment styles on romantic relationships. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 59, 971-980.

Trans-Generational Transmission of Attachment

Benoit, D. and Parker, K.C.H. (1994). Stability and transmission of attachment across three generations. Child Development, 65, 1444-1456

Bretherton, I. (1990). Communication patterns, internal working models, and the intergenerational transmission of attachment relationships. Infant Mental Health Journal, 11, 237-252.

Fonagy, P., Steele, M. and Steele, H. (1991). Intergenerational patterns of attachment: Maternal representations during pregnancy and subsequent infant-mother attachments. Child Development, 62, 891-905.

Fonagy P. and Target M. (2005). Bridging the transmission gap: An end to an important mystery in attachment research? Attachment and Human Development, 7, 333-343.

Jacobvitz, D.B., Morgan, E., Kretchmar, M.D., and Morgan, Y. (1991). The transmission of mother-child boundary disturbances across three generations. Development and Psychopathology, 3, 513-527.

Macfie, J., McElwain, N.L., Houts, R.M., and Cox, M.J. (2005) Intergenerational transmission of role reversal between parent and child: Dyadic and family systems internal working models. Attachment & Human Development, 7, 51-65

van Ijzendoorn, M.H. (1992) Intergenerational transmission of parenting: A review of studies in nonclinical populations. Developmental Review, 12, 76-99

Assessment of Parental Capacity

The central parenting quality that differentiates healthy from unhealthy parenting practices is the capacity for parental empathy.

Structured and firm parenting that is enacted with parental empathy for the child will be sensitive to both the child’s developmental need for structure and parental guidance, and for the child’s emerging individuation and self-expression (consistent with the child’s developmental period, i.e., infancy, early childhood, middle childhood, early adolescence, later adolescence).

Similarly, a parenting style that is more flexible and permissive which is enacted with parental empathy for the child will balance both the child’s need for autonomy and self-expression with the child’s developmental needs for limits and parental direction (consistent with the child’s developmental period).

The central parenting issue is not whether parents are structured and firm or flexible and permissive. The central defining feature of healthy parenting is the capacity for parental empathy.

Since the absence of parental empathy is a central defining characteristic of narcissistic and borderline personality organization, this means that the assessment for parental narcissistic and borderline personality traits becomes the central feature to be assessed for in all assessments of parental capacity.

Structured and firm parenting that lacks parental empathy for the child will be overly harsh, excessively punitive, and over-controlling, and will not allow the child sufficient latitude for the child’s emerging autonomy and individuation. Structured and firm parenting that lacks parental empathy for the child’s experience represents a narcissistic parenting style in which the parenting behavior reflects the parent’s needs for domination and control rather than the child’s need for reasonable limits and structure.

Flexible and permissive parenting that lacks parental empathy for the child will be too lax and disengaged and will not provide the child with appropriate structure and parental guidance. The child will be allowed too much autonomy that is beyond the child’s maturational level.  Lax and permissive parenting that lacks parental empathy for the child’s needs reflects a narcissistic parental self-focus on the parent’s own need to avoid conflict through the self-indulgent gratification of desires.

“The patient with NPD [Narcissistic Personality Disorder] often has a low tolerance for frustration and expects not only to have wishes easily gratified but also to remain in a steady state of positive reinforcement.” (Beck et al., 2004)

Problematic Parenting is the Absence of Parental Empathy

Problematic parenting emerges from the absence of parental empathy for the child’s experience that then interferes with the parent’s ability to recognize and respond to the child’s authentic needs.  Instead of responding to the child’s emotional and psychological needs, the absence of parental empathy for the child’s authentic experience leads the problematic parent to impose his or her own needs upon the parenting interaction rather than responding to the child’s needs for structure and parental guidance or for flexible parent-child dialogue and negotiation.

The absence of parental empathy arises from a narcissistic parental stance by the parent that places primacy on the expression of the parent’s own emotional and psychological needs over responding to the child’s authentic emotional, psychological, and developmental needs. This can result in the parent projecting onto the child the parent’s imagined needs for the child that are then used to justify for the parent the expression of the parent’s own emotional and psychological needs.

For example, a parent whose own emotional regulation of anxiety requires the parent to adopt a “protective parent” role for a supposedly “vulnerable child” will induce the child to become dependent and needy in order to allow the parent to enact the parent’s own need to be the “protective parent.”

Alternatively, the parent who needs to express anger and domination of the child, perhaps as an expression of the parent’s own emotionally traumatic experiences as a child, will then induce the child into becoming the “disobedient child” which the parent then uses to justify the expression of anger and punishment toward the child.

In problematic parenting, the child is being used to regulate the parent’s own emotional needs as the result of a parental failure of empathy that is a product of a narcissistic parental orientation toward the experience of the child.  Whereas in healthy parenting, the parent empathically attunes to the child’s needs and responds in a way that serves to regulate the child’s needs, either for parental guidance and structure or for parental dialogue and flexible support.

Often, the absence of parental empathy that originates from a narcissistic self-focused stance of the parent, that then produces problematic parenting responses that are misattuned to the child’s needs, is the product of the parent’s own family of origin experiences and so represent a trans-generational replication of parent-child experiences from the parent’s own upbringing and childhood.

We tend to parent our children in ways that are based on the patterns we develop from our own childhood experiences with our parents, so that the failure of parental empathy in one generation establishes the relationship template for the failure of parental empathy toward the next generation.

At its core, problematic parenting represents the absence of parental empathy for the child’s authentic needs that involves a narcissistic stance by the parent in which the parent’s behavior is a reflection of the parent’s own emotional and psychological needs rather than an empathically attuned response to the authentic emotional and psychological needs of the child.

Assessing Parenting Capacity

The central feature of parental capacity is parental empathy for the child’s experience that allows the parent to register and respond to the child’s authentic emotional, psychological and developmental needs.

Narcissistic and borderline personality organizations are characterologically INCAPABLE of empathy.

To the extent that narcissistic and borderline personality organizations are characterologically incapable of empathy, THE primary and central feature in all assessments of parental capacity should be the assessment for narcissistic and borderline personality traits of the parent.  Given the primary and central importance of parental empathy for healthy child development, all other parent-child factors (except direct child safety issues) should be secondary considerations relative to an assessment of parental capacity.

All mental health professionals involved in assessing parental capacity should therefore have a high level of professional expertise in recognizing both the features and the underlying personality dynamics of narcissistic and borderline personality organizations (e.g., Beck et al. 2004; Kernberg, 1975; Linehan, 1993; Millon, 2011).  A high level of professional expertise in narcissistic and borderline personality dynamics would represent a defining feature of professional competence regarding the assessment of parenting capacity.

Several factors in the assessment of possible narcissistic and borderline parental features would represent primary areas of prominent concern:

1.  Any evidence of the splitting dynamic (see Key Concept: Splitting post).  Splitting is a very distinctive interpersonal feature of both narcissistic and borderline personality processes (note: narcissistic and borderline personality organizations are variants of the same underlying personality organization; Kernberg, 1975).  Any evidence of splitting, either with a parent or in the child’s symptom display, should be of great concern and should trigger a more focused and targeted assessment for signs of parental narcissistic or borderline dynamics.

2.  Prominent indicators of a parental attitude of entitlement as evidenced by a repeated disregard for Court orders or the rights of the other parent.

“They [narcissists] are above the rules that govern other people… Unlike the antisocial personality, they do not have a cynical view of rules that govern human conduct; they simply consider themselves exempt from them.” (Beck et al., 2004,pp. 43-44)

 “Out of their vehement certainty of judgment, boundary violations of all sorts may occur, as narcissists are quite comfortable taking control and dictating orders (“I know what’s right for them”) but quite uncomfortable accepting influence from others” (Beck et al., 2004, p. 215)

“Narcissistic individuals also use power and entitlement as evidence of superiority… As a means of demonstrating their power, narcissists may alter boundaries, make unilateral decisions, control others, and determine exceptions to rules that apply to other, ordinary people.” (Beck et al., 2004, 251)

3. The incapacity to experience empathy.

Assessing the Capacity for Empathy

In assessing parental empathy, two domains in clinical questioning of the parent can reveal the capacity of the parent for empathic resonance with another person’s experience,

1.  The parent’s capacity for empathy for the other parent’s experience.

2.  The parent’s capacity for empathy regarding children’s love for both parents and developmental need for the child to have both parents in the life of the child.

Parental Empathy for the Other Parent

The clinical interview with the parent can engage a series of questions embedded into the clinical interview designed to elicit a response of empathy and understanding for the other parent’s experience.  While anger and judgment of the other parent may be present, there should at least be the capacity to understand the other person’s perspective from the other person’s point of view.

The narcissistic/borderline parent is unable to fake having empathy because the narcissistic/borderline personality lacks the capacity for empathy and so does not know when a normal-range empathic response is called for.  The narcissistic/borderline parent is entirely engaged in justifying the legitimacy of his or her anger (and the child’s anger) toward the other parent and so will reject all invitations by the clinical interviewer for demonstrating normal-range empathy for the other parent as a person.

Instead of empathy, the narcissistic parent will adopt a judgmental stance toward the other parent by asserting that the other parent “deserves” to suffer because the other parent is inherently a bad human being (a belief that represents a manifestation of the “all-bad” polarization of the splitting dynamic).

“If others fail to satisfy the narcissist’s “needs,” including the need to look good, or be free from inconvenience, then others “deserve to be punished”… Even when punishing others out of intolerance or entitlement, the narcissist sees this as “a lesson they need, for their own good” (Beck et al., 2004, p. 252).

The borderline personality parent will similarly blame the other parent rather than show any capacity for empathy, but will do so in a slightly different style from the more narcissistically organized parent.  Instead of empathy for the other parent, the borderline personality style will turn the focus back onto themselves (i.e. a narcissistic self-focus) by adopting a victimization stance relative to the other parent.  So invitations to show empathy for the experience of the other parent will produce a response from the borderline parent of justifying the borderline’s anger toward the other parent as being warranted by the borderline parent’s supposed victimization by the other parent.

Narcissistic Style: The narcissistic style parent responds to clinical invitations to display empathy for the other parent’s experience with a harsh judgmental attitude that the other parent “deserves” his or her suffering.

Borderline Style: The borderline style parent responds to clinical invitations to display empathy for the other parent’s experience by entirely disregarding the experience of the other parent and returning the focus back onto the borderline parent’s own self-experience of supposed victimization by the other parent.

Normal-Range: Normal-range parents display balance. Normal-range parents will at least display a capacity for empathy by acknowledging and understanding the legitimacy of the other parent’s experience from the other person’s perspective, although this may then be followed by their offering a complementary context of the situation from their own perspective.

Parental Empathy for the Child’s Bond to the Other Parent

Children love their parents. Both parents. Even bad parents.

Children love their parents and children want their parents’ love in return.

When children do not receive the love of their parents, children become sad. Children may also become frustrated when they cannot achieve their parents’ love, so sometimes children become sad AND angry when they cannot get the love of their parents. But children always WANT the love of their parents.

And children always love their parents. Even bad parents. That’s just the way the attachment system works.

Ainsworth, M.D.S. (1989). Attachments beyond infancy. American Psychologist, 44, 709-716.

“I define an “affectional bond” as a relatively long-enduring tie in which the partner is important as a unique individual and is interchangeable with none other. In an affectional bond, there is a desire to maintain closeness to the partner. In older children and adults, that closeness may to some extent be sustained over time and distance and during absences, but nevertheless there is at least an intermittent desire to reestablish proximity and interaction, and pleasure – often joy – upon reunion. Inexplicable separation tends to cause distress, and permanent loss would cause grief.

“An “attachment” is an affectional bond, and hence an attachment figure is never wholly interchangeable with or replaceable by another, even though there may be others to whom one is also attached. In attachments, as in other affectional bonds, there is a need to maintain proximity, distress upon inexplicable separation, pleasure and joy upon reunion, and grief at loss.” (p. 711)

The attachment system is a primary motivational system similar to other primary motivational systems for eating and reproduction.  It developed over millions of years of evolution involving the selective predation of children.  Predators are seeking the old, the weak, and the young. 

Children are prey animals.

Children who bonded to parents, i.e., to specific individual people, received parental protection from predators.  Children who bonded less strongly to parents fell prey to predators (and other environmental dangers).  Over millions of years of the increased survival advantage provided to children from bonding to their parents, a very strong and resilient primary motivational system developed that strongly motivates children’s bonding to parents.

Children love their parents. Both parents. Even bad parents.

Bad parents expose the child to predation and to other environmental dangers. Children who rejected bad parents died. Children who were MORE STRONGLY motivated to bond to bad parents had a better chance of survival than children who rejected bad parents. Over millions of years of evolution involving the selective survival advantage provided to children from an INCREASED motivation to bond to bad parents, the attachment system expresses an INCREASED child motivation toward bonding to bad parents.

Children love their parents. Both parents. Even bad parents.

Furthermore, except in a limited number of extraordinary circumstances, children benefit from relationships with both parents.

Those exceptional circumstances are:

1.  Child sexual abuse by a parent

2.  Parental physical violence as expressed in physical abuse of the child that endangers the child’s safety

3.  Parental emotional and psychological violence as expressed in psychological abuse of the child that endangers the child’s healthy emotional and psychological development

4.  Parental neglect that endangers the child’s safety

5.  Current parental alcohol or substance abuse that could reasonably expose the child to neglect or parenting behaviors that endanger the child’s safety or emotional and psychological development.

Except in these extraordinary circumstances, children benefit from relationships with both parents.

Children love both parents. Children want the love of both parents.

Every possible effort should be made to allow children to love both parents and to provide the child with the opportunity to be loved by both parents.

The Father-Son Relationship: A boy’s relationship with his father provides important gender-identity self-esteem, and the boy’s relationship with his father provides the son with gender related role modeling that is important for the son’s healthy maturation.

The Father-Daughter Relationship: A daughter’s relationship with her father provides her with important cross-gender self-esteem, every daughter should be her father’s princess, which will become an important self-esteem template for her in her choice of a marital partner.

The Mother-Son Relationship: The boy’s mother provides him with an invaluable source of nurturing love, and the mother-son relationship template will become important to the boy’s later choice of a marital partner.

The Mother-Daughter Relationship: A daughter’s relationship with her mother is one of the most wonderful and complex. It provides the daughter with important gender-identity self-esteem and gender role modeling that is vital for her healthy development.  The mother-daughter relationship becomes particularly impactful at the birth of the daughter’s first child, when she transitions from being a daughter in one relationship to being a mother herself in another relationship.

The understanding that children love their parents, both parents, and that they want to be loved by both parents is self-evident to everyone with normal-range empathy, because we all have an attachment system and we have all lived up close and personal with our own attachment system.  We all recognize from our own personal experience how the attachment system works relative children’s love for parents.

Children love their parents, both parents, even bad parents, and children want to be loved BY their parents.

And a child’s relationship with both parents is valuable and important for the child’s healthy development.

However, when the narcissistic and borderline personality parent is invited to demonstrate empathy for the child’s needs relative to the other parent, the narcissistic/borderline parent evidences a complete vacancy of empathic capacity.  For the narcissistic/borderline parent, relationships are superficial… and disposable.  And the psychological consistency demanded by the splitting dynamic (see Key Concept: Splitting post) requires that the ex-spouse also becomes an ex-parent.

Invitations to the narcissistic/borderline parent to show empathy for the other parent and for the child’s love for the other parent will be met with a profound vacancy of empathic capacity, and the capacity for empathy is THE central and primary feature of parental capacity.

Craig Childress, Psy.D.
Clinical Psychologist, PSY 18857

References

Personality Disorder

Beck, A.T., Freeman, A., Davis, D.D., & Associates (2004). Cognitive therapy of personality disorders. (2nd edition). New York: Guilford.

Kernberg, O.F. (1975). Borderline conditions and pathological narcissism.. New York: Aronson.

Linehan, M. M. (1993). Cognitive-behavioral treatment of borderline personality disorder. New York, NY: Guilford

Millon. T. (2011). Disorders of personality: introducing a DSM/ICD spectrum from normal to abnormal. Hoboken: Wiley.

Attachment

Ainsworth, M.D.S. (1989). Attachments beyond infancy. American Psychologist, 44, 709-716.

Assessing Parenting

Children’s Response to Problematic Parenting

In “parental alienation,” the proposal put forward by the child’s symptomatic rejection of a parent is that the parenting practices of the targeted-rejected parent are so problematic that they reasonably account for the child’s rejection of a relationship with the targeted parent. This allegation then invites an assessment of the parenting practices of the targeted-rejected parent to determine if the parenting of the targeted parent is sufficiently problematic as to account for the child’s symptomatic rejection of a relationship with this parent.

The question then emerges as to the features of problematic parenting that produce a child’s rejection of a parent.

It is extremely rare for a child to reject a parent.  This is because of a specific primary motivational system in the brain called the “attachment system.”

The attachment system is a neuro-biologically embedded primary motivational system in the brain that compels children to form strong affectional bonds to their parents. As a primary motivational system, the attachment system is analogous to other primary motivational systems for hunger and reproduction in the obligating power of its motivational directives.

The attachment system developed as a primary motivational system across millions of years of evolution as a direct consequence of the selective predation of children.  Predators target the old, the weak, and the young.  Children are prey animals.

Children who formed strong attachment bonds to parents were able to receive parental protection from predators, so that genes promoting the formation of strong child attachment bonds to parents were passed on in the collective gene pool.

Whereas children who formed weak, or even moderate attachment bonds to parents were less likely to receive parental protection from predators (and from other environmental dangers) and so these children were differentially more likely to fall prey to predators (and other dangers), thereby selectively removing genes for weak or even moderate child bonding to parents from the collective gene pool.

Over millions of years of evolution involving the selective predation of children, a very powerful and resilient primary motivational system developed that strongly promotes children’s emotional and psychological bonding to parents.

Because the attachment system confers significant survival advantage to children it is a very strong and resilient system that does not dysfunction easily.  It takes SEVERELY problematic parenting to terminate the attachment bonding motivation of children.

For example, the response of children to bad, or even abusive parenting is to develop an “insecure attachment” because the inadequate parental care of the bad and abusive parent exposes the child to potential predation (and other environmental dangers), so that the child becomes MORE motivated to form an attachment bond to the parent.

The response of children to bad parenting is to be MORE strongly motivated to seek attachment bonding with the abusive parent.

I want to be entirely clear on this, because this is how the authentic child brain works, the response of children to bad parenting is to be MORE strongly motivated to seek attachment bonding with the abusive parent.

While adults may sever adult relationships in response to poor treatment by the other person (such as in divorce), children DO NOT sever their relationship with a parent because of poor parenting.  In fact, bad and abusive parenting produces an INSECURE attachment that MORE STRONGLY motivates children toward bonding to the bad and abusive parent.

So while a husband or wife may divorce their spouse for bad treatment during the marriage, exactly the opposite is true for children’s relationships with their parents.

While on the surface this may seem counter-intuitive and we would expect children exposed to abusive parenting to seek to sever the attachment bonds to the abusive parent, but it’s actually the reverse.  No matter how problematic the parenting of the bad parent may be, the bad parenting is still better than even the best predator.

Children who rejected a relationship with a bad parent were more likely to die from neglect, starvation, predation, or environmental dangers than children who responded to the bad parenting by increasing their efforts to form an attached relationship bond to the bad parent.  Children who become MORE motivated to bond to the bad parent survive.  Children who become less motivated to bond to the bad parent don’t.

“All seven of these MM monkeys [i.e., Motherless Monkeys who were raised without mothers] were totally inadequate mothers… Initially, the MM monkeys tended to ignore or withdraw from their babies even when the infants were disengaged and screaming… Later the motherless monkeys ignored, rejected, and were physically abusive to their infants…A surprising phenomena was the universally persisting attempts by the infants to attach to the mother’s body regardless of neglect or physical punishment. When the infants failed to attach to the ventral surface of the mother, they would cling to the dorsal surface and attempt to move to the mother’s ventral surface.” (Seay, Alexander, Harlow, 1964, p. 353)

Seay, B. Alexander, B.K., and Harlow, H.F. (1964). Maternal behavior of socially deprived rhesus monkeys. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 69, 345-354

“The paradoxical finding that the more punishment a juvenile receives the stronger becomes its attachment to the punishing figure, very difficult to explain in any other theory, is compatible with the view that the function of attachment behavior is protection from predators.” (Bowlby, 1969, 226-227)

Bowlby, J. (1969). Attachment and loss. Attachment, Vol. 1. NY: Basic Books.

“A potential evolutionary explanation suggests selection pressures supported infants that remained attached because it increased the probability of survival.  From an adaptive point of view, perhaps it is better for an altricial animal to remain attached to an abusive caregiver than receive no care. (Raineki, Moriceau, Sullivan, 2010, p. 1143)

Raineki, C., Moriceau, S., Sullivan, R.M. (2010). Developing a neurobehavioral animal model of infant attachment to an abusive caregiver. Biological Psychiatry, 67, 1137-1145.

While these survival features may not be relevant in a parent-child relationship that occurs today, in the 21st Century, the advances in our civilization over the past several thousand years are not relevant to the functioning of the attachment system that evolved across a span of millions of years and that is neuro-biologically embedded into the brain as a primary motivational system.

Problematic and abusive parenting produces an INSECURE ATTACHMENT that MORE STRONGLY motivates the child to seek attachment bonding to the abusive parent.

John Bowlby, who first identified and described the attachment system, referred to the attachment system as a “goal corrected” motivational system, meaning that in response to problematic parenting the attachment system maintains its goal of forming an attached relationship bond with the parent, so that the child’s behaviors then become distorted in an effort to achieve this goal to the greatest extent possible in the context of the problematic parenting.

Avoidance of Aversive Parenting

Problematic parenting may lead children to avoid the painful parenting of the problematic parent, but it does not result in a termination of the child’s attachment bonding motivations toward the parent. The attachment system of the child CONTINUES to motivate the child to want to form an attached parent-child bond, but the problematic parenting prevents the formation of this attached bond

The frustrated motivation of the child to form an affectional attachment bond with the parent increases the child’s distress at not being able to form an attachment bond with the parent, and this increased distress creates the child’s “protest behavior” – see Parenting and Protest Behavior – to elicit the involvement of the parent.

In authentic parent-child conflict created by problematic parenting, the child’s “protest behavior” emerges from a frustrated effort to FORM a parent-child bond, it is NOT from a desire to SEVER the parent-child bond.

Change the problematic parenting that acts as a barrier to the formation of the affectional parent-child bond, and the protest behavior that is being caused by the child’s distress at not being able to form an affectional parent-child relationship goes away. 

That’s called “therapy.”

Resolve the features of the problematic parenting, and the child’s CONTINUING attachment bonding motivation will allow the formation of an affectionally attached parent-child relationship.

Problematic parenting may produce an avoidance response in the child, but NOT a termination of the attachment bonding motivation itself.

The attachment system is a primary motivational system, just like the hunger system.  When we don’t eat, we experience the distress of hunger.  But just because we are experiencing distress caused by not eating, that doesn’t mean that we don’t want to eat.  In fact, we want to eat even MORE when we’re hungry.

When the child’s desire for affectional attachment bonding with a parent is unfulfilled, the child experiences emotional distress (and so emits protest behavior).  But just because the child is experiencing distress and emitting protest behavior, that doesn’t mean that the fundamental motivational system for attachment bonding isn’t still active.  In fact, it’s even MORE active.

Just because we’re experiencing the distress of being hungry doesn’t mean that we don’t want to eat, and in an authentic parent-child relationship just because the child is experiencing distress at an unfulfilled attachment bond with the parent doesn’t mean that the child doesn’t want an attachment bond with the parent.

A child desire to terminate the child’s relationship with a parent is extremely unusual and is not at all a normal response to problematic parenting.

The primary motivational system still remains active even if we are in distress at our inability to satisfy the motivational press.

Parent-Child Conflict

Parent-child conflict is normal and developmentally healthy (see, Parenting and Protest Behavior). 

In some cases, child vulnerabilities or problematic parenting practices may elevate the severity of parent-child conflicts into unhealthy levels of excessive and extreme child displays of protest behavior.

Under no circumstances, however, is parent-child conflict ever lethal to the parent-child relationship, meaning that in no circumstances does parent-child conflict result in the termination of the child’s attachment motivations toward the parent.  No matter how bad the parent is, a bad parent is still far better than the predator.

Exceptions:

There are several exceptions, however, that CAN transmute parent-child conflict into a lethal strain that motivates the child to terminate the child’s relationship with the parent.  These exceptions are what should be assessed for in evaluating the parenting of the targeted parent that could be producing a termination of the child’s attachment bonding motivations.

  • Sexual abuse/incest

Parental sexual abuse of the child immediately and completely terminates the child’s attachment bonding motivations toward that parent.

The complete termination of the child’s attachment bonding motivation toward a parent is a very characteristic and singularly unique feature of the attachment system in response to incest.

The presence in “parental alienation” of the child’s motivated desire to entirely terminate a relationship with a parent, which is a singularly distinctive feature of the attachment system’s response to incest, suggests the possible presence of sexual abuse “source code” in the “files” of the attachment system that is being trans-generationally transmitted through distorted parenting practices from the original entry of the sexual abuse into the family system a generation or two prior to the current “parental alienation” iteration of the attachment system distortions.

  • Chronic parental violence expressed in physical child abuse

Years of excessive parental violence as expressed though physical abuse of the child, such as beatings with fists, belts, switches, or electrical cords, can sometimes result in the termination of the child’s attachment bonding motivations toward the violent parent.

When it occurs, the termination of children’s attachment bonding motivations toward a parent because of chronic parental violence toward the child tends to occur during early or middle adolescence (between the ages of 12-16).

  • Chronic parental violence expressed in spousal domestic abuse

Years of excessive parental violence as expressed though physical spousal abuse can sometimes result in the termination of the child’s attachment bonding motivations toward the violent parent.  In other cases, the child may develop an identification with the aggressor in which the child joins in the abuse directed toward the victimized parent/spouse.

When it occurs, the termination of children’s attachment bonding motivations toward a parent because of the chronic domestic violence directed by this parent toward the child’s other parent tends to occur during early or middle adolescence (between the ages of 12-16), at which time the child may stand up to the violent parent in an effort to protect the victimized parent.

  • Chronic parental alcoholism or substance abuse addiction

Most often, chronic parental alcoholism or substance abuse addiction creates a role-reversal parentification of the child into a caretaking role relative to the inadequate and addicted parent.  In some cases, after years of a dysfunctional parent-child relationship created by the alcoholic or substance addicted parent, the child may seek to terminate the parent-child relationship with the addicted parent.

When the child terminates the attached relationship with an addicted parent, the attachment bonding motivation remains active but is severed as a product of the parent’s continuing addiction-related dysfunctions, so that should the parent ever enter recovery and become non-addicted, the child’s attachment bonding motivation can become reactivated toward reconciliation in seeking and forming a parent-child bond.

When it occurs, the child’s efforts to terminate the parent-child relationship with an alcoholic or substance addicted parent tends to occur during the child’s early adulthood (between the ages 18-30).

Attachment-Based “Parental Alienation”

The only other family dynamic that can produce a lethal strain of parent-child conflict in which the child seeks to entirely terminate the child’s relationship with a parent occurs in a cross-generational parent-child coalition of the child with a narcissistic/(borderline) parent.

The addition of parental narcissistic/(borderline) psychopathology to a cross-generational parent-child coalition against the other parent can transmute the child’s conflicts with the other parent into a particularly malignant and virulent form of parent-child conflict in which the child seeks to entirely terminate the child’s relationship with the targeted parent.

The termination of the child’s attachment bonding motivations toward a normal-range and affectionally available parent as a result of a cross-generational parent-child coalition of the child with a narcissistic/(borderline) parent (i.e., attachment-based “parental alienation”) will be evident in a specific set of three characteristic and definitive diagnostic indicators in the child’s symptom display (see post, Diagnostic Indicators and Associated Clinical Signs).

In none of the other lethal strains of parent-child conflict (i.e., incest, chronic physical child abuse, chronic domestic violence, chronic parental alcoholism or substance addiction) will the child’s symptoms in seeking a child-initiated cutoff in the parent-child relationship evidence the specific set of three characteristic and definitive diagnostic indicators associated with an attachment-based model of “parental alienation.”

Assessment of Parenting

1.)  Targeted Parent:  If the child’s symptoms are evidencing a motivated desire from the child to terminate the child’s relationship with a parent, then the parenting behavior of the targeted parent should be assessed for the presence of the severely dysfunctional parenting that can sometimes result in the termination of the child’s attachment bonding motivations toward a parent,

  • Incest
  • Chronic physical abuse of the child (years)
  • Chronic domestic violence (years)
  • Chronic alcoholism or substance addiction (years)

The presence of these parenting behaviors would indicate pathogenic parenting by the targeted-rejected parent as the causal agent in the termination of the child’s attachment bonding motivations toward this parent.

2.)  Allied Parent: If the child’s symptoms are evidencing a motivated desire from the child to terminate the child’s relationship with a parent, then the parenting behavior of the supposedly allied and “favored” parent should be assessed for the presence of the three characteristic and definitive diagnostic indicators in the child’s symptom display of the child’s triangulation into the spousal conflict through a cross-generational coalition of the child with a narcissistic/(borderline) parent (i.e. attachment-based “parental alienation”),

  • Attachment System Distortion: The child seeks to terminate the child’s relationship with a normal-range and affectionally available parent.
  • Personality Disorder Symptoms: The child’s symptoms evidence a specific set of five narcissistic and borderline personality traits.
  • Delusional Belief: The child’s symptoms evidence an intransigently held fixed and false belief in the supposedly (abusive) parental inadequacy of the targeted-rejected parent.

The presence of this specific set of child symptoms would represent definitive diagnostic evidence for pathogenic parenting by the allied and supposedly “favored” parent as the causal agent for the termination of the child’s attachment bonding motivations toward the targeted-rejected parent.

3.)  Avoidance of Aversive Parenting: If the child is seeking to avoid aversive parenting by a parent, then the child’s attachment system remains active so that altering the aversive parenting practices of the parent that are creating the child’s avoidance of this parent will allow the formation of an affectionally bonded parent-child relationship.

If the child’s complaints regarding the problematic parenting behavior of the targeted-rejected parent are credible and confirmed through clinical interviews and observation, such as,

  • Overly intrusive, over-anxious parenting
  • Overly sad, depressed, and dependent parenting
  • Overly angry, hostile, critical, and punitive parenting
  • Overly controlling parenting relative to adolescent development

Then the problematic parenting practices should be specifically identified and therapy to change the identified problematic parenting practices should be initiated. Changes made in the parenting responses provided to the child will produce changes to the child’s behavior. 

If changes to the parenting behavior of the targeted parent do not produce corresponding changes in the child’s behavior, then the diagnosis of the parent-child relationship problems as representing the child’s efforts to avoid aversive parenting practices is in error (i.e., the child’s responses to the targeted parent are not under the “stimulus control” of the parent’s behavior, suggesting the presence of a cross-generational coalition of the child with the allied and supposedly “favored” parent against the other parent.

Note on Normal-Range Parenting:

There is wide variability in normal-range parenting, from lax and permissive parenting to more structured and firm parenting. Both ends of the parenting continuum can be normal-range and both approaches to parenting can produce healthy child development.

Parents have the fundamental right to establish family values through their approach to parenting. Some parents will value the improved relationship features available from parenting along the more lax and permissive spectrum of parenting practices, while other parents will value the improved child maturation of personal responsibility available from parenting along the more structured and firm end of the parenting continuum.

The decisions regarding the establishment of family values through parenting practices is the legitimate right of parents and is embedded within cultural values.

Broad latitude should be granted to parents in establishing family values through their parenting with their children.

It is only when parenting reaches the extremes on either end of the spectrum, either excessively lax and permissive parenting so as to represent child neglect, or excessively structured and firm parenting so as to represent emotional or physical child abuse, should broader societal standards for appropriate parenting be applied.

If we place parenting behavior along a continuum from 1 to 100, with lax and permissive parenting at the lower end of the spectrum and structured and firm parenting at the higher end, then normal-range parenting would fall between 20 and 80 on this scale.

Each style of parenting has positive and negative features, so that professional psychology tends to recommend parenting that falls in the mid-range spectrum (been 40 and 60 on a 100 point scale) that employs a balance of both reasonable parent-child dialogue and reasonable parent-imposed structure.

The relative balance of these two features, parent-child dialogue and parentally imposed structure, changes with the child’s increasing maturation, so that the amount of structure we provide to younger children, such as with a 5 or 6 year old child, is greater than the parental structure we would apply for older children, such as with a 15 or 16 year old adolescent who is preparing for entry into young adulthood.

As parenting practices move toward the more prominent use of a lax and permissive parenting approach over a structured and firm parenting style (20-40 on the 100 point scale), or toward the more prominent use of a structured and firm parenting style over a lax and permissive approach (60-80 on the 100 point scale) more problematic family issues can begin to emerge based on the parenting style employed, yet parenting from these more distinctively pronounced frameworks nevertheless remains normal-range and within the parental rights and legitimate prerogatives of the parent.

Broad latitude should be granted to parents in the establishment of values within their families.

Except in cases of prominent parental neglect or abuse, parents have a legitimate right to establish family values through their parenting practices, and it is up to children to adjust to parental values and expectations. Adjusting to parental rules, values, and expectations is an important part of child maturational development.  As long as the parenting practices are broadly normal-range (i.e., between 20 and 80 on a 100 point scale), then the rights and legitimate prerogatives of the parent should be respected and supported, and it is up to the child to adjust and adapt to the parenting approach.

If desired, therapeutic dialogue with the parent can be engaged regarding possible parenting approaches within the mid-range of the parenting spectrum that use a balanced blend of reasonable dialogue and reasonable structure, but such therapeutic dialogue should not undermine the legitimate parental right and the legitimate authority of the parent to establish family values that are consistent with the parent’s values as long as the parenting practices employed are broadly normal-range.

Healthy child development REQUIRES that the child adjust and adapt to imposed restrictions on the “degrees of freedom” available to the child that “constrain their children’s behavior in a way that promotes transitions to more highly organized, complex phases of organization.” (Cherkes-Julkowski & Mitlina, 1999, p. 7; see Parenting and Protest Behavior).  As long as parenting practices are broadly normal-range, healthy child development requires that the child adjust and adapt to the values of the parent as expressed in the parenting practices.

Reasonable parent-child dialogue that provides some restrictions on the child’s developing brain systems “while at the same time allowing enough degrees of freedom for the child to self-organize according to her or his own periodicities” (Cherkes-Julkowski & Mitlina, 1999, p. 14; see Parenting and Protest Behavior) can be encouraged, it nevertheless remains centrally important to healthy child development to support the legitimate rights, authority, and leadership of the parent in determining and establishing family values through the choice of parental responses and parenting practices.

Craig Childress, Psy.D.
Clinical Psychologist, PSY 18857

References

Cherkes-Julkowski, M. and Mitlina, N. (1999). Self-Organization of mother-child instructional dyads and latter attention. Journal of Learning Disability, 32(1), 6-21.