Domestic Violence/Abuse against Women

Violence against women is a major issue around the world. A large part of that violence comes in the form of domestic violence/abuse. Domestic violence and violence against women as a whole are hard situations to define, Flowers explains how our definition of domestic violence is changing with our understanding: “With advances in understanding relationships and effect of behavior, the definition of the battered woman has broadened in recent years. The term now reflects not only physical abuse but also psychological and emotional abuse, thus indicating woman can be victimized by their mates in many ways” (Flowers, 1996). The Definition of domestic violence against women is a changing thing depending on what studies or journals you read. This leads to many different definitions, each created for their own studies and journals. Thus, we find inconsistencies in the data put out by domestic violence studies, some studies claiming 12 month prevalence ratings of 2.1% for woman while others claim 28% for total abuse against women and men (Hegarty and Roberts, 1998). We need a competent definition of domestic violence against women. In this paper I will give you what I think to be the most competent definition of domestic violence against woman and compare its rates to others. I found what I believe to be the most competent domestic violence/abuse definition in a study done by Hegaty and Roberts in 1998. The study was comprised of many other domestic violence/abuse studies that each had their own definitions of domestic violence/abuse. It compared the findings of each of the studies and examined the impacts that their definitions may have had on the statistical data. The definition goes as follows: “Persistent abuse with one partner being afraid of and/or hurt by the other”; the abuse is then split into subcategories: “Physical