What is Domestic Violence?

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Domestic violence - sometimes called battering, relationship abuse, or intimate partner violence - is a pattern of abusive or coercive behavior used to establish power and control over another person through fear and intimidation, often including the threat or use of violence.

Tactics such as physical abuse, threats, intimidation, isolation, sexual abuse, controlling finances and other behaviors are used by the batterer to maintain power and control over the victim. Domestic violence tends to escalate and become more severe over time. This violence occurs in every community, regardless of income, gender, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation or religion.

Domestic Violence doesn't just happen at home.

Domestic violence impacts the lives of millions of working women and men every day. It also affects the financial strength and success of the companies for which they work and the communities where they live.

• 1 in 4 women will experience domestic violence in her lifetime.  ^[1]
• Domestic violence costs U.S. businesses nearly $6 billion annually in aggregate costs, including more than $4.1 billion in direct medical and mental health services and $1.8 billion in productivity losses.  ^[2]
• Domestic violence accounts for 8 million lost paid work days a year. ^[3]
• 74 percent of domestic violence survivors are harassed by their partner while they are at work. ^[2]

What is domestic violence?