Decisions of Greek Courts Securing the Right of Parent–Child Communication and Their Determinants

Abstract

Background: There is an increasing awareness that a child’s separation from one parent after the divorce places the child’s development and well-being at risk. The aim of this study was to determine how Greek courts deal with the cases of parental prevention of communication with their children and which factors affect the judicial decisions. Methods: The Greek legal databases “NOMOS” and “Isokratis” were searched, and associations between judicial decisions, as well as communication prevention ways, and several parameters, were assessed. Results/Conclusions: A total of 50 parental communication prevention law cases were retrieved for the time period from 1992 to 2019. Results showed that mothers were more frequently alleged to interfere with father–child communication. Both direct and indirect methods of interfering with communication were followed. In cases of a single child, the method of indirect interference was more frequently followed. Judicial decisions were unaffected by the age and gender of the child, the gender of the parent preventing the communication, the number of children, the gender of the child and whether the child is the same gender as the preventing or prevented parent, the way of prevention, and the reference to parental alienation.