“One woman described life threatening physical assaults, one of which resulted in a broken vertebrae in her neck. She was in physical pain for months following this beating. However, when asked to describe the most painful battering incident, she said it was her husband commanded her to get on her knees and make sounds like an animal.
Definitions of abuse and domestic violence can be confusing. Many researchers have used physical violence, resulting in bodily injury as a primary definition. Yet it is clear that for many victims of domestic violence, psychological and emotional abuse is at least as harmful, if not more so than physical abuse.
