IL CONTRIBUTO DELLA PSICODIAGNOSTICA CLINICA E FORENSE ALLA VALUTAZIONE MEDICO LEGALE DELLE COMPETENZE E DELLA IDONEITÀ GENITORIALE

Parenting, with its multiple skills and declinations, is a construct difficult to define. Forensic psychiatric and psychological assessment required to experts is also complex. Psychological tests, if correctly used, could be an useful and crucial instrumnet for forensic assessment. It would be desirable that the expert, who wish to apply a proper forensic methodology, allows to distinguish - either in the report or in the debate - statements based on evidences and scientific literature from assumptions or personal opinions. For this reason, psycho-diagnostic instruments offer a significant and irreplaceable contribution, even with all their limitations: they do not replace clinical and forensic investigation, but integrate it, providing reliable and scientifical measurements..It is clear that clinical evaluations, based on psychodiagnostics, should be interpreted in a legal key. Tests can be, if properly used, a useful and decisive contribution to these difficult assessments. In this delicate area of forensic work, the expert should not only consider clinical aspects, but he has also to consider the narrative, historical, existential, criminological and contextual dimensions of subjects and their systems.