The facts
The lay of the land, with every number attributed
Numbers about domestic abuse circulate widely and are frequently wrong, or quoted without the study behind them. Everything here comes from the World Health Organization, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, United Nations reporting or a country's own Demographic and Health Survey, and every figure links to the publication it came from.
How to read these numbers
What the evidence does and does not say
- Prevalence figures are estimates built from population surveys, not from police reports. They carry confidence intervals, and the published reports state them. We quote the central estimate and name the report so you can check it.
- Under-reporting is documented in every one of these studies. The true figures are widely accepted to be higher than the measured ones, particularly for men, for elders, and for sexual violence.
- Different sources measure different things. A lifetime prevalence figure and a past twelve months figure are not interchangeable, and we label which is which.
- None of these numbers describe an individual. Statistics establish scale. They do not tell you whether what is happening in your home counts. It counts.