In Massachusetts it is called “Best interest of the Child Standard” and it is a child centered standard. It is focusing not on the parents needs, but the child’s needs in which a parent or if both parents are best suited to meet the child’s needs. There is not a difference between genders that the courts will factor in. It is determining what the court thinks is best for the child physically, mentally, morally and/or emotionally.

There is an interesting case E.K. vs. S.C. 97 Mass App. .ct .403 in 2020 that talks about a Judge’s conclusion that based on mother’s destructive relationship with the child’s school and treatment professionals they demonstrated that she was unable to act in the child’s best interest. The father who was able to meet the child’s needs and provide a more stable home for the child was allowed to have custody and move the child out of state to New Hampshire where the court found that there was a real advantage to the child and the transfer of custody to the child was in father’s best interest.

However, there were some recommendations about a better way for the court to have procedurally have both custody change and the order out of state then how the judge procedurally did it, but still found that this was warranted.