“Parental alienation has been described as “a child’s strong insistence or rejection of a parent that is disproportionate to that parent’s behaviour and out of sync with the previous parent-child relationship”. Parental alienation is also “the notion that the child’s decision to refuse to have a relationship with the targeted parent is without justification or without convincing reason.” Ciarlariello v. Luele-Ciarlariello, 2014 ONSC 5097, at para. 3; and K.F.M. v K.G.T., 2023 BCSC 1347, at para. 259.
In A.M. v. C.H., 2019 ONCA 764, the Court of Appeal confirmed that parental alienation is a legal concept as opposed to a mental health diagnosis and, as such, the court can make a finding of alienation based upon an analysis of the facts alone without expert evidence.
McKinnon, J., in Fielding v. Fielding, 2013 ONSC 5102, at paras. 134-137, accepted the expert evidence that parental alienation was established if the following four criteria were present: 1) there was a prior positive relationship with the targeted parent; 2) there is an absence of abuse by the targeting parent; 3) the alienating parent uses many of the alienating strategies; and 4) the child exhibits most of the alienated child behaviours.
In paragraphs 108-109, in A.M. v. C.H., 2018 ONSC 6472, supra, Nicholson, J. set out the list of factors developed by experts to aid the court in identifying parental alienation. These factors, also known as indicators of alienation, have been cited in many cases,: L.(A.G.) v. D.(K.B.) (2009), 2009 CanLII 943 (ON SC), 93 O.R. (3d) 409 (Ont. S.C.), at para. 92 [L.(A.G.)]; G.(J.M.) v. G.(L.D.), 2016 ONSC 3042 (CanLII), at para. 134 [G.(J.M.)]; Maharaj, at para. 140.”