i. PAS’s Etiology Is Legal, Not Medical page 6

Vol. 26 ♦ No. 1 ♦ Spring 2006
Jennifer Hoult
Evidentiary Admissibility of Parental Alienation Syndrome
http://209.198.129.131/images/EvidentiaryAmissibilityofPAW_Hoult_CLRJ_2006.pdf

Page 6

i. PAS’s Etiology Is Legal, Not Medical
Gardner claimed that the cause of PAS was
maternal programming stemming from laws that
threaten to take children from their mothers.
122
He claimed that PAS only existed in countries
that use an adversary legal system,
123
 and that
judges, lawyers, guardians  ad litem (“GALs”),
children’s counsel, and therapists promulgate
PAS.
124
 Gardner claimed that legal processes cause
PAS and make mothers and children psychopathic,
125
 and that adversary proceedings “intensify psychopathology” generally.
126
 However, he
provided no evidence that laws or litigation can or
do cause medical pathology, and no evidence that
women and children become psychopathic as a
result of adversarial litigation.
127