The chameleon child: Children as actors in the high conflict divorce drama. Garber, B. Journal of Child Custody, 11(1):25–40, USA, 2014.
The chameleon child: Children as actors in the high conflict divorce drama [link]Paper  abstract   bibtex   
Contemporary theory asserts that children become triangulated into their parents' conflicts due to alienation, estrangement, and enmeshment. These dynamics account for some children's alliance with one parent and rejection of the other. The present article suggests that the child's innate need to adapt and the caregivers' corresponding needs for confirmation together create an additional dynamic that must be considered as part of any family system evaluation. The “chameleon child” engages in necessary and natural short-term adaptive behaviors at unknown developmental costs. An observational protocol is described with which evaluators can begin to distinguish among these dynamics. Case illustrations are provided.
@article{Garber2014The,
  author = {Garber, B.},
  title = {The chameleon child: Children as actors in the high conflict divorce drama},
  journal = {Journal of Child Custody},
  address = {USA},
  year = {2014},
  volume = {11},
  number = {1},
  pages = {25--40},
  abstract = {Contemporary theory asserts that children become triangulated into their parents' conflicts due to alienation, estrangement, and enmeshment. These dynamics account for some children's alliance with one parent and rejection of the other. The present article suggests that the child's innate need to adapt and the caregivers' corresponding needs for confirmation together create an additional dynamic that must be considered as part of any family system evaluation. The “chameleon child” engages in necessary and natural short-term adaptive behaviors at unknown developmental costs. An observational protocol is described with which evaluators can begin to distinguish among these dynamics. Case illustrations are provided.},
  keywords = {divorce; custody; alienation; estrangement; enmeshment; adaptation; attachment; Qualitative Research; Short-term Consequences},
  url = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/15379418.2014.892805},
  language = {English}
}

Downloads: 0