The Complementary Roles of Scientific and Clinical Thinking in Child Custody Evaluations

Abstract

Child custody evaluations (CCEs) have largely been governed by the scientific method. The need to use scientific reasoning has been identified. This article proposes that two scientific principles contribute to scientific reasoning in forensic mental health assessments (FMHAs): falsifiability and consistency. It proposes a “Step-Down” schema in which data consistently supporting one alternative hypothesis establishes a baseline of validity for an expert's opinion; unexplained inconsistent data reduces that validity; and unexplained logically contradictory data reduces it further and may destroy or falsify it. Using the schema, expert opinions in a CCE with sexual abuse and parental alienation allegations are analyzed. Ultimately, the schema makes evaluators more aware of the foundation they need to produce valid expert opinions; in guiding their integration of all data into their opinions; and in providing attorneys and judges with a rational basis on which to challenge the weights experts give to parts of the evidence.

KEYWORDS:

• expert testimony
• assessment issues
• sexual abuse
• parental alienation
• weighing data