Recent legislative developments such as “Kayden’s law” have added to the complications of intervention with high conflict families. Polarized thinking, long a feature of these families, has increasingly been amplified in public and academic discourse which fails to capture the true complexity of these families and risks to children who fail to resolve relationship issues. This crisis represents both risk and opportunity. Children are at lifelong risk when families don’t receive the help they need, or if they receive poor quality services. We have the opportunity to tighten our language, address training gaps including cultural relevance and provide tools for identifying quality services and crafting orders that address new and emerging legislative issues. Our multidisciplinary panel will address these issues with case example, update relevant science, provide methods for promoting cultural relevance, and provide tools for judges and lawyers to support high quality services and intervene when problems arise.
Learning Objectives:
- Participants will be able to identify Kayden’s Law and two potential implications for family court cases in California.
- Participants will be able to create sample goals for family intervention that address the needs of the family system and are scientifically supportable.
- Participants will be able to identify two strategies for adapting services to ensure that they are culturally relevant.
- Participants will be able to identify two essential elements of orders for services to families demonstrating high conflict and resist-refuse dynamics.