Taking into account the social and psychological assessment of family relationships as one of the factors of the judge's inner conviction in making a decision on determining the child's place of residence

Issue: № 3, 2021

Doi: https://doi.org/10.37634/ efp.2021.3.3

The paper explores the legal problem of determining the place of residence of a minor child with one parent. The emergence of European and national jurisprudence and its current approaches to resolving such disputes are analyzed. Theoretical and practical issues of determining the child's place of residence, taking into account its best interests on the basis of studying the case materials of national courts and analyzing the decisions of the European Court of Human Rights. In the context of the specified the author's approach of application of norms of the civil procedural legislation concerning optimization of the mechanism of definition of a place of residence of the child on the basis of the conclusion of the expert of the psychologist is offered. The author emphasizes the need for the court to take into account the conclusions of psychologists when deciding to determine the child's place of residence. States that the child's opinion can be reflected in written and electronic evidence, of the conclusions, of the psychological examination, of the conclusion, of a specialist psychologist, psychological examination, of the child's testimony in the courtroom and by videoconference. Property capabilities of each parent from the standpoint of case law are not decisive because a more important criterion for consideration in making a decision is the psychological relationship between the child and parents. The issue of ensuring the interests of the child is based on the understanding that the divorce of parents for children and always a heavy psychological burden and adults dealing only with their problems forget about the radical changes in the life of the child: new environment and place of residence, inability to communicate with both parents at the same time, etc. Diagnosis by a psychologist of the peculiarities of child-parent relationship should be organized in accordance with all psychometric requirements and carried out using professional methods and techniques. Taking into account the psychological characteristics of the child, the psychologist will be able to provide an opinion on the appropriateness of determining the place of residence of the latter with his mother or father.

Keywords : best interests of the child, determination of place of residence, court, psychological knowledge, expertise, examination

References:

1. Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine: Official web-portal of the Parliament of Ukraine. «Legislation of Ukraine». URL: https://zakon.rada.gov.ua (in Ukrainian).

2. Unified state register of court decisions URL: https://reyestr.court.gov.ua (in Ukrainian).

3. European Court of Human Rights. URL: https://www.echr.coe.int

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