Mothers Without Custody Project (original) (raw)
Related papers
The noncustodial parent and medical treatment
The Bulletin of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law, 1993
Despite the frequency of divorce, there are no comprehensive guidelines for the relative rights of custodial and noncustodial parents. Since there are no definite rules for the parties to follow, divorced parents receive conflicting advice and are more likely to engage in bitter misunderstandings. This paper creates a framework for defining whether the noncustodial parent has a right to authorize emergency medical care, routine medical care, serious nonemergency medical care, psychiatric evaluation, and psychiatric treatment. The author suggests that the noncustodial parent should be able to authorize routine medical treatment, but not routine psychiatric treatment.
Factors Influencing a Divorced Father’s Involvement with His Children
One of the outcomes of divorce that has appeared consistently over the years has been a lessening of contact between divorced noncustodial fathers and their children. This review synthesizes empirical evidence to portray the formidable obstacles that men face in maintaining contact with their children after dissolution of their co-residential relationship with the child's mother. Its goal is to bring new understanding to observed behavior patterns of divorced fathers. We will briefly examine what the research tells us takes place in many fathers who have been divorced from their wives and have lost physical custody of their children.
Collateral Damage: The Lived Experiences of Divorced Mothers Without Custody
Journal of Divorce and Remarriage, 2010
This qualitative study utilizing narrative analysis and grounded theory examines the history and experiences of 14 Canadian women who have lost custody of their children within a legal divorce process. Each woman’s storied experience focused on themes of attachment and loss associated with involuntary child absence, legal abuse within the adversarial system, and judgment based on nonconformity to a motherhood ideal; physical violence and emotional abuse in the family system; access denial and parental alienation; stigma and lack of support services; and serious financial losses. Women’s perceptions of their children’s needs in the divorce process, mothers’ responsibilities in relation to those needs, and the responsibility of social institutions to support mothers as parents were also examined. The study sought mothers’ views about needed changes to the legal framework of child custody determination and other priorities. Implications for socio-legal policy are discussed, including a consideration of a rebuttable legal shared parental responsibility presumption as facilitating the most salutary postdivorce outcomes for women and children, as are guidelines for direct service provision.
Law and Human Behavior, 2001
Findings from comparisons of joint and sole custody families that do not control for predivorce differences in demographic and family process variables (factors that may predispose families to choose or be awarded joint custody) are of limited generalizability, since obtained group differences may be attributable to predisposing (self-selection) factors, custody, or both. This study compared a random sample of 254 recently separated, not-yet-divorced families on 71 predivorce variables that might plausibly differentiate between families awarded joint legal versus sole maternal custody. Twenty such factors were identified and controlled for in subsequent comparisons of 52 sole maternal and 26 joint legal custody families 2 years postdivorce. Families with joint custody had more frequent father-child visitation, lower maternal satisfaction with custody arrangements, more rapid maternal repartnering, and fewer child adjustment problems (net of predivorce selection factors). Moreover, these effects did not appear to be moderated by level of predecree parental conflict. No association between custody and fathers' compliance with child support orders was obtained.
Noncustodial Parent's Report of Child Support Payments
Family Relations, 1991
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Divorce, custody, and spousal violence: a random sample of circuit court docket records
Journal of Family Violence, 2003
The fastest growing marital status category in America is divorced, with the number of divorced individuals quadrupling between 1970 and 1996. The majority of children in divorced families live with a single parent and often lose contact with the noncustodial parent. A recent review of the literature suggests that many noncustodial fathers fail to keep contact with their children and become delinquent in child support payments because of their dissatisfaction with the custody arrangement. However, there has been little examination of how custody arrangements are typically determined or settled. In addition, divorces that involve spousal violence bring further complications to child custody, visitation, and child support decisions. This study included a 20% random sample of court records for all divorces settled in one county judicial circuit court during 1998. The purpose of this study was to examine characteristics of divorcing adults as well as characteristics of child custody arrangements, visitation, and child support decisions. Contrary to popular belief, findings from this study indicate that divorce actions were almost always settled through agreement of the divorcing parties rather than by adjudication. About 38% of the couples had children in common and between 78 and 92% of cases were settled through agreement, which suggests that fathers are in fact agreeing to the custody arrangement, rather than being forced into it. About one in five records overall noted spousal violence, and there was no significant difference in settlement methods for couples with or without spousal violence. Cases with children and spousal violence were significantly more likely to have also mentioned substance use and postdecree activity. This study suggests a need for more focused attention on divorce cases with spousal violence to reduce postdecree court involvement and safety of children and adult victims, as well as further study into what causes noncustodial parents to lose contact with their children.
Purpose: Active duty military personnel are a unique segment of the United States population. Service members and families live and work in a high cost environment. As a result, military members are more likely than the general population to experience marriage dissolution. The purpose of this research is to explore the impediments associated with the implementation and operation of a broadly defined child support enforcement program designed to assist a military population. Method: As this work is exploratory, and to a great deal, introductory, pillar questions are used to guide the inquiry process. Sub-pillar questions were developed in order to answer each main pillar question. These pillar questions were developed based on a review of the literature. The literature reviewed focused on active duty military personnel and program implementation. A case study methodology is used to assess the impediments associated with the implementation and operation of a broadly defined child support enforcement program. The data-collection techniques used in this research are semi-structured interviews, document analysis, and direct observation. Findings: The preliminary findings indicate the military lifestyle makes expedited access and referral the most valuable resources a broadly defined child support enforcement program can offer service members and their families. The most common services requested from soldiers and their families include help with enforcement, custody and visitation, paternity establishment, review and adjustment, and order establishment. The military population in general is often reluctant to ask for help. As a result, enforcement agencies should establish a proactive outreach program. Broadly defined child support programs should employ comprehensive training programs, which encourage employees to participate and follow existing policy
Shared custody has risen to the fore as one of the most contentious issues facing family law justice systems. Ongoing efforts to implement or contemplate legislative reforms to prescribe a rebuttable presumption for shared custody have been central. Drawing on indepth, retrospective qualitative interviews with 28 young adults between 18 and 25 years of age, this researcher conducted a thematic analysis and examined children's perspectives and motivations regarding transitions into and out of shared custody, relationships with parents, and their sense of fairness around decision-making. The dissertation research is presented in a 'publications format' and contains an introduction, three self-contained journal-ready publications and an overarching discussion.
Journal of family psychology : JFP : journal of the Division of Family Psychology of the American Psychological Association (Division 43), 2003
Relocation cases, in which a divorced parent seeks to move away with the child, are among the knottiest problems facing family courts. The recent trend is to permit such moves, largely because of Wallerstein's (1995) controversial amica curiae brief, which a recent court (Baures v. Lewis, 2001) interpreted as supporting the conclusion that "in general, what is good for the custodial parent is good for the child" (p. 222). The current study provides the first direct evidence on relocation by dividing college students into groups on the basis of their divorced parents' move-away status. On most child outcomes, the ones whose parents moved are significantly disadvantaged. This suggests courts should give greater weight to the child's separate interests in deciding such cases.