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Thank you for your interest in learning more about domestic violence, the Domestic Violence Services Network (DVSN) and what you can do to help your friends and neighbors create safer communities.

Massachusetts Law

Many people think that domestic violence is when a husband hits his wife. While this is often true, domestic violence means much more than physical harm.

In the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, the law states that domestic violence occurs if any:

• household member
• dating partner
• married or formerly married partner
• parent of a child in common, or
• relative by blood or marriage:
  1. attempts to cause physical harm
  2. causes physical harm
  3. places another in fear of physical harm, or
  4. causes another to engage involuntarily in sexual relations by force, threat, or duress

DVSN's Definition

DVSN's definition of domestic violence includes the legal definition stated above and also includes other forms of abuse. At DVSN,

domestic violence is defined as a pattern of coercive control that one individual intermittently exerts over another by means of spiritual, emotional, sexual, physical, or economic abuse.

Domestic Violence in Affluent Communities