Conducting Child Custody Evaluations: A Comprehensive Guide [Paperback]

Philip M. Stahl (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0803948212 | ISBN-13: 978-0803948211 | Publication Date: August 15, 1994 | Edition: 1994

This important contribution to understanding the whole process of conducting child custody evaluation, based on the author's extensive experience, examines in detail the complex questions and issues involved.

The many topics addressed include: interviewing parents and children; testifying in court; writing custody evaluations; assessing the capacity to parent; assessing the attachment of children to their parents; planning custody and parental access; children's adjustment to divorce; domestic violence, drug and alcohol abuse; mental illness; parental alienation; and on-going evaluation.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Philip Stahl, PhD, ABPP (Forensic), is a psychologist in private practice that conducts child custody evaluations and provides expert witness testimony. He is a provider of continuing education for psychologists and other mental health providers, and attorneys and Family Law Specialists in California. He has conducted trainings throughout the United States and internationally for child custody evaluators and others working with high-conflict families of divorce. He has presented workshops for judges throughout the country and is on the faculty of National Judicial College and is a frequent presenter at programs of the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges.

As a Board member of the Association of Family and Conciliation Courts, he was on the task force that drafted AFCC’s “Model Standards of Practice for Child Custody Evaluation”. He was a member of the American Bar Association Wingspread Task Force on High Conflict Families. Dr. Stahl is on the Editorial Review Board of AFCC’s journal, Family Court Review and the Journal of Child Custody. Along with his teaching, Dr. Stahl has written extensively on various issues in high-conflict divorce and custody evaluations. His previous books have been Conducting Child Custody Evaluations: A Comprehensive Guide, Complex Issues in Custody Evaluations, and Parenting After Divorce, 2^nd Edition, and he is the co-editor of Relocation Issues in Child Custody Cases. His child custody evaluation was cited by the California Supreme Court in its landmark decision modifying 8 years of relocation case law in 1994 (In re Marriage of LaMusga 32 Cal.4th 1072, 12 Cal.Rptr.3d 356, 88 P.3d 81). Most recently, Dr. Stahl was on the workgroup appointed by the Arizona Supreme Court that re-wrote Arizona’s “Planning for Parenting Time” (2010).

When he has free time, Dr. Stahl enjoys traveling, playing golf, and relaxing with family and friends.

Product Details

• Paperback: 280 pages
• Publisher: Sage Publications, Inc; 1994 edition (August 15, 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0803948212
• ISBN-13: 978-0803948211
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.5 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #354,717 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Philip Stahl, PhD, ABPP (Forensic), is a psychologist in private practice that conducts child custody evaluations and provides expert witness testimony. He is a provider of continuing education for psychologists and other mental health providers, and attorneys and Family Law Specialists in California. He has conducted trainings throughout the United States and internationally for child custody evaluators and others working with high-conflict families of divorce. He has presented workshops for judges throughout the country and is on the faculty of National Judicial College and is a frequent presenter at programs of the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars a must for all...., April 30, 2003

By 

Jeffrey T Crocker (Derry, NH United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Conducting Child Custody Evaluations: A Comprehensive Guide (Paperback)

if you are going to have a child custody matter you better read this book!!! read what they look for before you have an evaluation, be prepared!

7 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Guide to the Perplexed, December 6, 2003

By 

Sam Vaknin (Skopje, Macedonia) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Conducting Child Custody Evaluations: A Comprehensive Guide (Paperback)

A surprisingly fresh and impressively comprehensive guide to the convoluted process of custody evaluations. The need for these court-mandated evaluations arises when one of the parents - often, the father - is a repeat offender, an abuser.

Abusers are thought by practitioners of psychology to be emotionally disturbed, the twisted outcomes of a history of familial violence and childhood traumas. They are typically diagnosed as suffering from a personality disorder, an inordinately low self-esteem, or codependence coupled with an all-devouring fear of abandonment. Consummate abusers use the right vocabulary and feign the appropriate "emotions" and affect and, thus, sway the evaluator's judgment.

As Lundy Bancroft correctly observes, Confronted with this contrast between a polished, self-controlled, and suave abuser and his harried casualties - it is easy to reach the conclusion that the real victim is the abuser, or that both parties abuse each other equally. The prey's acts of self-defense, assertiveness, or insistence on her rights are interpreted as aggression, lability, or a mental health problem.

The book draws attention to these pitfalls and provides a through description of the system and its protagonists. Sam Vaknin, author of "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited".