Divorce and the Modern Family

In today’s changing social landscape, divorce has become a significant and immutable feature. Currently, more marriages end in divorce than do not. The reasons for this are many and complex, and although these reasons are debated, the fact of the predominance of divorce is not disputed. With this upswing in divorce comes also an explosion in the number of children of divorce.

Due primarily to social and legal changes that occurred in the 1970’s, the dilemma of where and with whom the child would live primarily became a reality that more of us knew directly or indirectly. Simply put, child custody disputes have became a much more prominent feature of our everyday lives. Children are routinely fought over in custody disputes, and seldom does a day pass that one does not hear of some tragic and sometime violent event that occurred in the context of a custody dispute. Related to this, the courts have become choked with allegations of one spouse abusing the other spouse and/ or the children, again in the context of one of these custody disputes. It is within this complex social and legal context that the terms Parental Alienation and Parental Alienation Syndrome were born.