The Best Interests of the Child: Decision-Making Factors

1998 ◽  
Vol 79 (3) ◽  
pp. 331-340 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mary Banach
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Critical Incident ◽  
Critical Incident Technique ◽  
Best Interests ◽  
Family Court ◽  
Qualitative Design ◽  
Subjective Interpretation ◽  
The Family ◽  
Decision Making Factors ◽  
Best Interests Standard

This study examines the factors considered by professionals working within the family court arena when they apply the standard of best interests of children to make a determination about where a child should reside. This study uses a qualitative design based on the critical incident technique. Recorded interviews were conducted with all respondents using a semi-structured format in which they were asked to delineate the factors they relied on to make a decision in a case in which they were involved. Results indicate that professionals rely on three domains to make decisions using the best interests standard: precipitating events, guiding principles, and case variables. Respondents also generally agreed that the best interests of children as a standard can be subjectively interpreted to the detriment of clear and unbiased decisions. Recommendations for use of these domains in decision-making concerning the best interests of children are proposed as a guard against the subjective interpretation of the standard.

Still a Mother

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jackie Krasas
Keyword(s):  
Social Institutions ◽  
The United States ◽  
Gender Violence ◽  
Best Interests ◽  
Family Court ◽  
Reproductive Justice ◽  
The Status ◽  
Employment Education ◽  
Being There ◽  
Best Interests Standard

This book traces the trajectories of mothers who have lost or ceded custody to an ex-partner. The book argues that these noncustodial mothers' experiences should be understood within a greater web of gendered social institutions such as employment, education, health care, and legal systems that shapes the meanings of contemporary motherhood in the United States. If motherhood means “being there,” then noncustodial mothers, through their absence, are seen as nonmothers. They are anti-mothers to be reviled. At the very least, these mothers serve as cautionary tales. The book questions the existence of an objective method for determining custody of children and challenges the “best-interests standard” through a feminist, reproductive justice lens. The stories of noncustodial mothers that the book relates shed light on marriage and divorce, caregiving, gender violence, and family court. Unfortunately, much of the contemporary discussion of child-custody determination is dominated either by gender-neutral discussions or, at the opposite end of the spectrum, by the idea that fathers are severely disadvantaged in custody disputes. As a result, the idea that mothers always receive custody has taken on the status of common sense. If this was true, as the book's author affirms, there would be no book to write.

scholarly journals Engaging parents in Family Court: Lessons from an observational study of child protection cases

2016 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 129-146 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vicki Lens
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Decision Making ◽  
Child Protection ◽  
Participatory Approach ◽  
The Other ◽  
Family Court ◽  
Court Cases ◽  
Court System ◽  
Northeastern United States ◽  
The Family

Summary This study explores the courtroom interactions between judges, attorneys, and parents charged with child abuse or neglect. Drawing on ethnographic observations of court cases in a Family Court located in the northeastern United States, this study seeks to understand how judges encourage or inhibit parents’ participation and the strategies and tactics used to influence parental behaviors and obtain cooperation with court orders. Findings On one end of the spectrum are judges who engage little, or not at all with parents, preferring to speak only to the professional court actors. On the other end of the spectrum is a more participatory approach, with judges weaving parents into court room exchanges and engaging them in informational and decision-making dialogs. A similar divergence appears when soliciting cooperation from parents, with some judges relying on shaming rituals and others using a softer approach that incorporates praise and support. Applications Strategic interventions are identified that will increase parents’ cooperation and satisfaction with the Family Court system. These include vigorously engaging in both informational and decision-making dialogs with parents and using rituals of praise and support, rather than shaming.

scholarly journals Family support in the control of hypertension

2008 ◽  
Vol 16 (5) ◽  
pp. 871-876 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rosana dos Santos Costa ◽  
Lidya Tolstenko Nogueira
Keyword(s):  
Content Analysis ◽  
Cardiovascular Diseases ◽  
Family Support ◽  
Family Relationships ◽  
Critical Incident ◽  
Critical Incident Technique ◽  
Financial Health ◽  
Individual Interviews ◽  
The Family ◽  
Emotional Aspects

Hypertension is related to the incidence of cardiovascular diseases. Family support is essential for the patient to control the disease. This study aimed to analyze whether the family positively contributes to the patient's control of the disease. The research was carried out in 2005 in Teresina, PI, Brazil and involved people who were enrolled in the Hypertension Program of an Integrated Health Center. Data were collected through individual interviews, using the Critical Incident Technique. After the content analysis, the element Consequence was identified in 146 references, 58 positive and 88 negative, composing four categories: Family, Financial, Health and Emotional Aspects. Difficulties in family relationships, patients' concern with their descendants, and the families' little involvement in the patients' care were identified through the reports.

‘Turning up the volume’: Increasing respect for the wishes and feelings of women with intellectual impairment in decisions about their reproductive rights in England and New Zealand

2021 ◽  
pp. 096853322110447
Author(s):  
Joanna M Manning
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
New Zealand ◽  
Case Law ◽  
Best Interests ◽  
Family Court ◽  
Persons With Disabilities ◽  
Court Judge ◽  
Mental Capacity Act 2005 ◽  
The Will ◽  
Mental Capacity Act

In 2004 a New Zealand Family Court Judge ordered that two extremely serious and irreversible interventions (termination of pregnancy and sterilization) be carried out on a 29-year-old woman, with mild to moderate intellectual disability, over her strenuous objection. Though her appeal was partially successful, an option which both respected her wishes and feelings and in all likelihood better promoted her best interests was not explored. A decade later, another Family Court judge held that it was in the best interests of a young woman with Down syndrome to be sterilized for contraceptive purposes, in spite of her indication that she might wish to have babies one day. The decisions were made under NZ’s adult guardianship legislation, into which courts have incorporated a best interests principle, which they have interpreted broadly. But, in contrast to the Mental Capacity Act 2005 (MCA), NZ’s statute lacks any requirement for decision-makers to take into account the wishes and feelings of the person with mental impairment. That requirement has been the catalyst for a more-empathetic, person-centric interpretation in English case law. Further reform to the MCA is advocated for, which would give formal primacy to P’s wishes and feelings through presumptions or special phrases, as well as requiring a reasoned justification for departing from them. The Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities goes even further: the article 12 right to legal capacity requires respect for the ‘will and preferences’ of people with mental impairments and controversially, according to the UN Committee’s interpretation, requires the replacement of substitute decision-making regimes based on best interests with supported decision-making frameworks based on a person’s will and preferences.

The Best Interests Standard for Incompetent or Incapacitated Persons of All Ages

2007 ◽  
Vol 35 (1) ◽  
pp. 187-196 ◽  
Author(s):  
Loretta M. Kopelman
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Decision Makers ◽  
Best Interests ◽  
Medical Decisions ◽  
Comfort Care ◽  
Aging Society ◽  
American Academy Of Pediatrics ◽  
Decision Making Capacity ◽  
Baby Doe ◽  
Best Interests Standard

When making decisions for adults lacking decision-making capacity and having no discernable preferences, widespread support exists for using the Best Interests Standard. For example, the President's Council on Bioethics supports this view in its publication, Taking Care: Ethical Caregiving in Our Aging Society. The President's Council maintains that decision-makers should seek the best available care for incapacitated adults, yet clarifies the best care does not always extend biological life for the longest time and advocates careful attention to comfort care and pain control. Their recommendations for making medical decisions for incapacitated adults match guidelines by American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) committees and by the U.K’.s Nuffield Council on Bioethics report for making medical decisions for children and infants.For reasons of consistency, fairness, and compassion, this guidance should be applied to all people lacking decision-making capacity. Uniform guidelines, however, would be incompatible with a policy for infants based on the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act (CAPTA) amendments, widely known as the “Baby Doe” Rules.

Navigating complex end-of-life decisions in a family-centric society

2019 ◽  
Vol 27 (4) ◽  
pp. 1003-1011
Author(s):  
Guozhang Lee
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
End Of Life ◽  
Careful Consideration ◽  
Best Interests ◽  
End Of Life Decisions ◽  
Difficult Decision ◽  
The Family ◽  
Decision Making Processes ◽  
End Of Life Decision ◽  
Economic Considerations

End-of-life decision making frequently involves a complex balancing of clinical, cultural, social, ethical, religious and economic considerations. Achieving a happy balance of these sometimes-competing interests, however, can be particularly fraught in a family-centric society like Singapore where the family unit often retains significant involvement in care determinations necessitating careful consideration of the family’s position during the decision-making process. While various decision-making tools such as relational autonomy, best interests principle and welfare-based models have been proposed to help navigate such difficult decision-making processes, their application in practical terms, however, is dubious at best. This case report is presented to highlight these issues and explore the utility of these frameworks within the Singapore end-of-life care context when the interests of the family may be dissonant from those of the patient.

scholarly journals Acknowledging Children’s Voice and Participation in Family Courts: Criteria that Guide Western Australian Court Consultants

2017 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
pp. 155-163 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vicki Banham ◽  
Alfred Allan ◽  
Jennifer Bergman ◽  
Jasmin Jau
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Western Australia ◽  
Family Court ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Circuit Court ◽  
Regulatory Guidance ◽  
Family Courts ◽  
Rights Of The Child ◽  
Australian Family ◽  
The Family

The Australian family courts introduced Child Inclusive Conferencing after the country adopted the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. The legislation governing these conferences is minimalistic but the Family Court Consultants in the Family Court of Australia and the Federal Circuit Court have well-developed and documented guidelines. The Family Court of Western Australia is, however, a separate entity and in the absence of regulatory guidelines its Family Consultants developed their own process and criteria. This model is unique, in Australia at least, because it has been organically developed by the practitioners providing the Child Inclusive Conferences with very little, if any, statutory and regulatory guidance. This model therefore serves as an example of how practitioners think child inclusive services should be offered. The model is, however, not documented and the aim of this study was to understand and document Family Consultants’ decision making regarding if and when they will conduct a Child Inclusive Conference in the Family Court of Western Australia. Ten Family Consultants were interviewed using semi-structured interviews. A thematic analysis was conducted on the transcripts of the interviews identifying 12 themes. Overall the data suggested that Family Consultants take into account a range of criteria and although they were very cognisant of the importance for the child to be engaged in decision making they noted specific challenges regarding how they could use Child Inclusive Conferencing to do this. These findings provide a basis for the development of regulations that ensure that Child Inclusive Conferences are used optimally to improve the inclusion of children in the family court procedures in Western Australia and potentially elsewhere. Further research is, however, necessary before such regulations can be finalised.

scholarly journals Decision Making in Organizations: Intuition, Information, and Religiosity

2020 ◽  
Vol 6 (3) ◽  
pp. 152-158
Author(s):  
B. George
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Religious Belief ◽  
Scientific Method ◽  
Critical Incident ◽  
Critical Incident Technique ◽  
Balance Theory ◽  
General Tendency ◽  
Cultural Contexts ◽  
Business Executives ◽  
Intuitive Decision Making

Previous research in experimental psychology suggests that religious belief is influenced by one’s general tendency to rely on intuition rather than information. A corollary emerging from this based on balance theory is that managers who are religious might make more intuition-based decisions than their counterparts who are not religious. The latter group might tend to make more information-based decisions. Recent research also indicates that the use of scientific method, a close cousin of information-based decision making, triggers moral behavior. Employing critical incident technique, the present researchers test this potential relationship among business executives at various ranks, various cultural contexts, and holding various religious beliefs. Our analysis indicates that theist managers, both gnostic and agnostic, preferred intuitive decision making. Likewise, both gnostic and agnostic atheist managers preferred information-based decision making. Also, atheist managers articulated better logical explanations as to why their decisions were morally correct.

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