Mothers and fathers have rights where their child is concerned. When a man believes he has fathered a child by a woman, he can request a paternity test. In such a test, DNA from his body cells are matched with DNA from the child’s body cells. If they match to a significant degree, then he is declared to be the father. But what if the woman does not wish to have such a test conducted? What if she does not want the man to be involved in her life and the child’s life and she refuses to allow the test by not presenting the child for the collection of cells for testing? Can she refuse the paternity test?

Women who seek to establish the paternity of their child have two options available to them: an in home paternity test and a legal DNA paternity test. The in home paternity test, true to its name, can be conducted in home and requires no specialists or notarized paper trail to validate the test results. The purpose of this test is for general knowledge, and the results would not be admissible in a court of law. The other option is a legal DNA paternity test, and can only be performed by specialists with the results sent to a laboratory for analysis and validation. This kind of test is the only kind that can stand up in a court of law.