Factors Influencing the Child’s Expressed Views in the Context of High Conflict Parental Separation and Divorce: A Literature Review
Authors:   , Thompson Maria 
Published: August 2022

Children are active participants in the context of high conflict parental separation or divorce and may become estranged from one or more significant family members without legitimate justification. Any child’s estrangement from significant family members at the time of parental separation is of significant concern and greatly reduces the social assets of those children, often for their lifespan. This may include reducing the child’s capacity to create and nurture loving, intimate relationships in their adult years with their future partners and children. While the child’s expressed views are held in high regard in the context of custodial litigation, little is understood regarding the sources of influence on the child’s views. Within the context of separation and divorce, different perspectives exist from legal, social, and psychological realms, and even within the bounds of each school of thought, inconsistencies, paradoxes, and contradictions are ubiquitous. Much of the contemporary literature supports the association between intense parental conflict as a causal factor in negatively influencing the child’s expressed views and the child’s decision to resist or refuse contact with a parent. However, current empirical research on this topic remains hotly debated and significant knowledge gaps exist in terms of how the child’s expressed views can also be influenced by a multitude of additional factors such as professional’s presuppositions, mediative and litigative processes, and the parent’s and child’s psychophysiological responses. This systematic review of the literature aims to source key intrapersonal, interpersonal, and system-level factors that influence the expressed views of children and quantify where research exists and where gaps in the research occur. This review found that key features influencing the child’s expressed views in high conflict separations are parental relationship distress, the child’s cognitive and emotional development, the nature and strength of existing attachment relationships, the assessment tools recruited to evaluate concerns, therapeutic and legal professional’s competencies, and mediative or litigative service processes. Significant gaps in the literature were located with respect to psychophysiological theory, and a priori hypotheses that provide for deductive and abductive reasoning rather than inductive analysis that ‘open the door’ to a professional’s confirmatory bias. This review also found there is a paucity of empirical studies in Australia with respect to the efficacy of system-level factors such as mediative and litigative services upon which these families rely for support. Further to this, no research to date is available for Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander peoples, Culturally and Linguistically Diverse (CALD) communities, or Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer or Intersex (LGBTQI) communities who navigate western dominated, heterosexually oriented, separation and custody services. Recommendations from this systematic review include opportunities for future research that will broaden and deepen the current knowledge base and enhance a professional’s capacity to identify possible alternate methods to better support a diverse range of separating families. Many professionals and researchers anecdotally understand that the child’s expressed views are often a contaminated rendition strongly influenced by parental conflict and alienation. This requires researchers to find new ways to accurately hear the authentic expressed views of the child in their attempts to provide empirical evidence that supports family law courts in litigative decision-making processes. It also recommends an examination of the practices of professionals including family therapists, social workers, and legal practitioners to enhance support and prioritise healthy engagement of parents and the child in recognition that this relationship has the capacity to provide a critical social asset for the child over the lifespan.