UM School of Social Work Prof. Geoffrey Greif, PhD, MSW, comments on the case of three abductees in Ohio who were rescued this week after being held under mentally and physically grueling circumstances that are gradually being made known. Adjustment and reunification with relatives will likely be difficult, described as “ambiguous reunification,” in a journal article by Greif, who has studied such circumstances and is an international expert. Greif, professor at the University of Maryland School of Social Work, is co-author of When Parents Kidnap, and of Family reunification after a lengthy abduction, (pp1-52) in the book published by the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children. In October 2012, the journal Families in Society published “Ambiguous Reunification: A Way for Social Workers to Conceptualize the Return of Children After Abduction and Other Separations.” Link to article: http://tinyurl.com
Dr. Greif can be interviewed by phone at 410-706-3567, by email: [email protected] in person, or in a studio for which logistics can be arranged. Greif's bio: http://tinyurl.com/btdtsd4
Greif’s comment on the Ohio case (for immediate release): “People assume that now that families are back together, again, troubles are over. But they might have a struggle after that to get accustomed to each other again. After so many years, the families continue to grow and change in different ways and so do the abductees. When reconciliation occurs, they are very different people that if they had been together. To function, it may be best for them to regard each other as new people to love instead of assuming each is as they were.”
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