Abstract

LAGO, Vivian de Medeiros  and  BANDEIRA, Denise Ruschel. Psychology and some current issues in family law. Psicol. cienc. prof. [online]. 2009, vol.29, n.2, pp. 290-305. ISSN 1414-9893.

The interdisciplinary aspect between psychology and law requires psychologists to search for knowledge which has not been acquired during college education. Therefore, three topics were chosen to be discussed in this paper: joint custody, parental alienation syndrome and false allegations of sexual abuse. The article aims to present a theoretical review about these topics, in which their concepts and historical aspects are discussed. Besides the theoretical review, this work presents the results of a research that investigated extracurricular education, knowledge and the opinion on family law of experienced psychologists about these emerging topics. Findings indicated that most of the participants know about and have experience in the demands required. Even though, the discussion of the results pointed out the need of dealing with these and other topics related to forensic psychology during psychologists’ education. Lastly, it is highlighted the importance for the psychologist to get familiar with questions of family law, in order to consider in his/her psychological assessment the emotional bonds which are healthier for the children’s development.

Keywords : Forensic psychology; Joint custody; Parental Alienation Syndrome; Sexual abuse.

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