Relationship Abuse: Rethinking the Language We Use to Describe Abuse Between Partners
The term Intimate Partner Violence (IPV) is well established in research, healthcare, behavioral health, and public policy. However, the word “intimate” can create an unintended assumption in public understanding—particularly the assumption of sexual intimacy.
In everyday language, many people associate intimate with sexual or physical closeness. As a result, the term intimate partner violence can unintentionally lead people to believe that sexual intimacy is a defining characteristic of the relationship or a prerequisite for the violence to be recognized.
It is not.
Relationship abuse is fundamentally about power, control, coercion, intimidation, manipulation, exploitation, and harm within the context of a relationship. The existence, absence, or status of sexual intimacy does not determine whether abuse has occurred.
People can experience abuse within dating relationships, marriages, former relationships, co-parenting relationships, long-term partnerships, and relationships that have ended. A person does not have to be sexually intimate with another person for that relationship to involve abuse.
WHY LANGUAGE MATTERS
Professionals understand what IPV means. The public does not always interpret the terminology through a clinical lens.
When educating survivors, families, students, professionals, courts, and communities, we should use language that is immediately understandable and does not inadvertently create misconceptions.
“Relationship abuse” provides a broader and more accessible description of the problem.
It places the focus where it belongs:
THE RELATIONSHIP.
THE BEHAVIOR.
THE POWER AND CONTROL.
THE HARM.
This is not an argument that Intimate Partner Violence is technically or academically incorrect. It is an argument for more accessible and precise public-facing language.
A MORE INCLUSIVE WAY TO TALK ABOUT ABUSE
Relationship abuse is abuse that occurs within the context of a relationship—regardless of whether the people involved are currently together, previously together, sexually intimate, or no longer intimate at all.
Our terminology should never create an unintended question in the mind of a survivor:
“Does what happened to me count if we weren’t intimate?”
Yes. It counts.
Because abuse is defined by the behavior and the harm—not by sexual intimacy.
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Dr. Kathie Mathis, Psy.D., D.D.
Forensic & Behavioral Health Specialist
CEO, California Cognitive Behavioral Institute