UB Program To Provide Support For Kids Coping With Divorce

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- Divorce can make children feel angry, depressed, guilty, sad and helpless. The court system provides children with a law guardian to represent their legal interests, but they may need emotional support even more.

And although the number of court-related programs for families has tripled in the past four years, programs for children have not kept pace, statistics indicate.

Parents and Children in Transition, or PACT, should help to change that situation for the better in Western New York. In an unusual partnership, Frank Fincham, Ph.D., professor of psychology at the University at Buffalo, and the Hon. Vincent C. Doyle, Jr., chief administrative judge of the judicial district that includes Erie County, have developed a program that will provide social support and education about divorce and teach coping skills -- free of charge -- to children of the nearly 3,000 divorce cases handled annually by Erie County courts.

The program will be launched later this month, with the first two-part session scheduled for March 25 and April 1. All sessions will be held in the Gloria J. Parks Community Center on Main Street in Buffalo.

"The program is based on cutting-edge psychological research about what helps children adjust to their parents' separation and what puts them at risk for problems in the future," said Fincham, a specialist in family relationships. "It is one of the few such programs in existence anywhere in the country that does not draw on any local resources or collect any fees for service. Typically, these programs cost $30 per session."

The UB Department of Psychology will provide the program as a community service, with Doyle's support and a grant from the Ittleson Foundation.

Fincham and a group of doctoral-level students in clinical psychology will conduct the sessions, which will accommodate up to a dozen children between the ages of 9-12. They will participate in two 2 1/2-hour group sessions on consecutive Saturday mornings.

Counselors will lead children in games and activities designed to help them understand and talk about their feelings surrounding their parents' separation, and to dispel misconceptions about what will happen to them. One approach will be a true-false line game in which counselors present statements, both inconsequential and divorce-related. Children will answer by moving to the true or false mark on the line.

"If we say, 'Divorce means that parents leave their children,' and a child indicates he believes that statement is true," Fincham said, "then we can ask him why he believes that, and get him talking about his fears."

Counselors also will provide children with coping skills to help them through the time of transition, Fincham said. "Children going through a divorce feel many of the same emotions as adults, but they don't necessarily know what to do about them. We'll try to help them label their emotions. When you have a name for it, coping with it becomes easier.

"We also try to teach them to communicate their feelings to their parents instead of acting out. For example, rather than throwing a tantrum to distract parents when they're arguing, we encourage children to tell their parents early on that their arguing is very upsetting and to ask them not to argue in front of them," Fincham noted.

The program also will include a parent session, where counselors will discuss ways they can support and help their children during the separation and divorce.

Counselors will evaluate the program's effectiveness through activities designed to determine what the children have learned.

Fincham said he envisions this initial program as the first phase of a much broader intervention that he hopes eventually will include intensive follow-up and a mentoring program involving UB students.

Anyone interested in PACT may call 645-3650, ext. 242, or visit the Web site at http://www.pact.cjb.net.