What is Parental Alienation Syndrome?

PAS is a form of abuse that typically arises in the context of child custody disputes during or after a divorce.

According to Gardner, a noted pyschologist who originally identified and began investigating teh syndrome:

1. Parental Alienation Syndrome (PAS) is a disorder that arises primarily in the context of child-custody disputes. 

2. Its primary manifestation is the child's campaign of denigration against a parent, a campaign that has no justification. 

3. It results from the combination of a programming (brainwashing) of a parent's indoctrinations and the child's own contributions to the vilification of the targeted parent.

In severe cases of parent alienation, the child is utterly brain- washed against the alienated parent. The alienator can truthfully say that the child doesn't want to spend any time with this parent, even though he or she has told him that he has to, it is a court order, etc. The alienator typically responds, "There isn't anything that I can do about it. I'm not telling him that he can't see you."

Other psychologists have identified specific behaviors related to the psychology of the abuser, in particular, aspects of psychopathic behavior that allows them to do what to most normal people would seem excessively cruel and abusive:

Psychopathic Behavior

Bona fide abuse-neglect Abusive and neglectful parents are often psychopathic. They may have little guilt over the victimization of others, even children who are often safe targets for their hostility. They cannot project themselves into the children whom they victimize. They use any deceitful maneuver they can to shift blame away from themselves. They do not give consideration to the future consequences of their behavior on their children; for example, ongoing misery, formidable grief, relentless fear, and severe psychopathology. Such abusers are likely to have a history of psychopathic behavior in other realms of their lives. The nonabusing spouse is far less likely to exhibit psychopathic behavior, although such spouses usually have psychological problems of their own, considering the fact that they have married or involved themselves with an abusive person.

It is probable that among severe PAS inducers, there may be a higher percentage of psychopathic people than in the general population. It is probably also the case that psychopaths are overrepresented in those who abuse and/or neglect their children. In general, therefore, this is not a good differentiating criterion--when one compares groups of PAS inducers with groups of abusers-neglecters. However, it is a good differentiating criterion for assessing a single couple, because the presence of this trait in one of the parents can be useful in substantiating whether that parent is a PAS indoctrinator or whether he or she is an abuser-neglecter.

PAS Whereas some parents who induce a PAS are not fully appreciative of what they are doing, others are consciously and deliberately inducing the alienation. The latter will often profess innocence when confronted with their manipulations and are completely aware of the fact that they are lying. Many PAS inducers are psychopathic in association with the PAS programming but generally are not psychopathic in other realms of their lives. Furthermore, they are less likely to have been psychopathic prior to the onset of the child-custody dispute. When psychopathy is seen in a PAS programmer, it is more likely to be seen in the severe type, as is the case with paranoia. Psychopathy in other realms of life, outside of the family, is an important discriminator between the psychopathy seen in the PAS inducer and the psychopathy of the bona fide abusive-neglectful parent. Furthermore, the victim of the PAS inducer's indoctrinations, like the nonabusing spouse of the bona fide abuser, is not particularly likely to exhibit psychopathic tendencies.