Domestic Violence Services of Cumberland & Perry Counties (Pennsylvania)

Glossary of Terms

Domestic Violence: A complex system of power and control behaviors that an intimate partner or family member uses to control another person’s individual freedom that includes emotional abuse, economic abuse, sexual abuse, threats, intimidation, and isolation.

PFA: (Protection from Abuse Order see FAQ’S section for more info)
A PFA is a binding civil order that prohibits batterers from harming their victims again. These orders can be a critical component of the battered woman’s safety.

Victim Blaming: An erroneous judgment made against victims of domestic violence that holds that women are partly responsible for being abused because they can control the violence, or else provoke the violence, and can therefore avoid these assaults by changing their behaviors.

Physical Abuse: A pattern of physical assaults, threats or restraints.

Sexual Abuse: Any mistreatment by means of sexual objectification, forced sexual acts, demands, insults or physically attacking the sexual parts of the body.