- Domestic/dating violence (also known as intimate partner violence) is a pattern of controlling behaviors that one partner uses to get power over the other. It includes:
- any kind of physical violence or threat of physical violence to get control
- emotional or mental abuse, such as playing mind games, making you feel crazy, or constantly putting you down or criticizing you
- Sexual abuse, including making you do anything you don’t want to do, refusing to have safe sex or making you feel badly about yourself sexually
- 85 percent of domestic violence victims are women.
- One third of American women and one quarter of women worldwide will experience domestic/dating violence in their lifetime.
- An estimated 1.3 million women are victims of physical assault by an intimate partner each year.
- Only 25 percent of all physical assaults perpetuated by intimate partners are reported to the police.
- Females who are 20-24 years of age are at the greatest risk for of nonfatal intimate partner violence.
- Boys who witness domestic violence are twice as likely to abuse their own partners and children when they become adults.
- Domestic violence is the leading cause of injury to women – more than car accidents, muggings, and rapes combined.
- One half of all homeless women and children in the US are fleeing from domestic violence.
- Every 9 seconds in the US a woman is assaulted or beaten.
- In 70 to 80 percent of intimate partner homicides, no matter which partner was killed, the man physically abused the woman before the murder.
Use texting to help fight dating abuse. GO
Sources: National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, National Coalition for the Homeless, Domestic Violence Statistics, Domestic Violence Resource Center
