Heads up – incoming.
You will want to familiarize yourself with a rating scale: the Brief Psychiatric Rating Scale (BPRS), “one of the oldest most widely used scales to measure psychotic symptoms.”
Wikipedia BPRS
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brief_Psychiatric_Rating_Scale
The professional article is online and provides the BPRS manual of anchor points for 24 symptoms.
BPRS Article & Manual
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/284654397_Brief_Psychiatric_Rating_Scale_Expanded_version_40_Scales_anchor_points_and_administration_manual
The items of primary relevance are 9) Suspiciousness and 11) Unusual Thought Content (delusions). The clinical concern is for a possible persecutory thought disorder (in the allied parent transferred to the child; i.e., a shared/induced persecutory delusion).
I will be recommending that the BPRS rating scale be applied in all child custody conflicts involving severe attachment pathology displayed by the child (i.e., a child rejecting a parent).
I recommend BPRS ratings for items 9) Suspiciousness and 11) Unusual Thought Content (delusions).
I also recommend BPRS ratings for 3) Depression (grief response), 2) Anxiety (phobic response), 6) Hostility (anger response), and 20) Uncooperativeness.
We need to get clarity on the child’s symptoms. We accomplish that by using a reliable symptom documentation instrument, i.e., the BPRS.
You’ll begin to hear me reference the BPRS. You should familiarize yourself with the anchor points for the relevant sub-scales of 9) Suspicousness and 11) Unusual Thought Content (delusions).
As a lay person, you can apply the anchor points to the child’s symptom presentation to indicate your perspective and reporting on the child’s symptoms.
However, ultimately we will want a formal mental health assessment of the child’s symptoms using the BPRS to anchor our understanding for the nature, scope, and severity of the child’s symptom presentation.
Craig Childress, Psy.D.
Clinical Psychologist
WA 61538481
OR 3942 – CA 18857
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