SOME FACTS and STATISTICS
  • Domestic violence is also known as intimate partner violence (IPV).
  • Domestic violence or IPV is a pattern of abusive or coercive behavior of willful intimidation characterized by the control carried out or committed in a harmful way by an intimate partner against another person through physical, economical / financial, emotional, psychological, sexual and / or verbal abuse.
  • Domestic violence, IPV, battering, is violence committed by a spouse, ex-spouse, current or former boyfriend or girlfriend.  It can occur between heterosexual or same-sex couples.
  • Domestic violence is one of the most under reported crimes.
  • In the United States, every 9 seconds a woman is assaulted or beaten.
  • One in every four women will experience domestic violence in her lifetime.
  • Eighty-five percent of domestic violence victims are women.
  • Females between 16 to 24 years of age are at greatest risk of nonfatal intimate partner violence.
  • Nearly 1 in 5 teenage girls who have been in a relationship said a boyfriend threatened violence or self-harm if presented with a breakup. (This is called dating violence.)
  • Domestic violence is the leading cause of injury to women--more than car accidents.
  • Studies suggest that up to 10 million children witness some form of domestic violence annually.
  • Domestic violence victims lose nearly 8 million days of paid work per year in the United States alone--the equivalent of 32,000 full-time jobs.
  • The costs of intimate partner violence in the United States alone exceeds $5.8 billion per year; $4.1 billion are for direct medical and health care services, while productivity losses account for nearly $1.8 billion.
  • Men who as children witnessed their parent's domestic violence were twice as likely to abuse their own wives than sons of nonviolent parents.
  • Everyday in the US, more than three women are murdered by their husbands or boyfriends.
  • Regardless of marital status, race, religion, income, age, gender, ethnicity, physical ability or sexual orientation domestic violence affects people in every community.
  • Domestic violence HURTS everyone; it is time to eradicate the abuse, to end the violence NOW.


National Coalition of Domestic Violence