Another Non-Stranger
Someone who is known by sight but is not represented in the categories described above (i.e., not a current or
former spouse, another current or former intimate partner, a family member not intimate partner, a person in a
position of authority or trust, a friend/acquaintance, or a person briefly known). Examples include someone in
your neighborhood, maintenance people, customers, clerks, or someone met online.
Commercial Establishment
A business such as a restaurant, a bar or club, or a gym or athletic facility (not an exhaustive list).
Control of Reproductive or Sexual Health
Includes controlling or attempting to control a partner’s reproductive health and/or decision making. This also
includes SV behaviors by the perpetrator that increase the risk for sexually transmitted diseases and other
adverse sexual health consequences (e.g., unintended and frequent pregnancies). Examples include not allowing
the use of birth control, coerced or forced pregnancy terminations, and forced sterilization because of abuse.
Disability
The Americans with Disabilities Act defines a disability as “a physical or mental impairment that substantially
limits one or more major life activities.”13 Major life activities include, but are not limited to, caring for oneself,
performing manual tasks, seeing, hearing, eating, sleeping, walking, standing, lifting, bending, speaking,
breathing, learning, reading, concentrating, thinking, maintaining emotional stability, communicating, and
working.
Family Member not Intimate Partner
Someone sharing a relationship by blood or marriage, or other legal contract or arrangement (i.e., legal
adoption, foster parenting). This includes current as well as former family relationships. Therefore, though not an
exhaustive list, stepparents, parents, siblings, former in-laws, and adopted family members are included in this
category. This category excludes intimate partners.
Friend/Acquaintance
Someone who is known to the victim but is not related by blood or marriage, and is not an intimate partner.
Examples are a co-worker, neighbor, roommate, classmate, first date with someone you knew before and/or
continued to know, or a fellow member of an organization such as churches, clubs, or other community groups
(not an exhaustive list).
Incident
A single act or series of acts of SEXUAL VIOLENCE that are perceived to be connected to one another and that may persist over
a period of minutes, hours, or days. One perpetrator or multiple perpetrators may commit an incident.
Examples of an incident include a husband forcing his wife to have unwanted sexual acts but only one time,
a stranger attacking and sexually assaulting a woman after breaking into her apartment, a man kidnapping a
female acquaintance and repeatedly assaulting her over a weekend before she is freed, a college student forced
to have sex by several men at a fraternity party, a man forcing his boyfriend to have unwanted sex, or a family
member touching the genitalia of a child during a visit.
Intimate Partner
An intimate partner is a person with whom one has a close personal relationship that may be characterized by
the partners’ emotional connectedness, regular contact, ongoing physical contact and sexual behavior, identity
as a couple, and familiarity and knowledge about each other’s lives. The relationship need not involve all of
these dimensions.
Intimate partner relationships include current or former:
• spouses (married spouses, common-law spouses, civil union spouses,
domestic partners)
• boyfriends/girlfriends
• dating partners
• ongoing sexual partners
Intimate partners may or may not be cohabiting. Intimate partners can be opposite or same sex. If the victim
and the perpetrator have a child in common and a previous relationship but no current relationship, then by
definition they fit into the category of former intimate partner.
States differ as to what constitutes a common-law marriage. Users of the site should
consult their respective state’s policies to determine the qualifications of a common-law marriage in their state.
Illness
An abnormal process in which aspects of the social, physical, emotional, or intellectual condition and function of
a person are diminished or impaired compared with that person’s previous condition.15 Illness can be a short- or
long-term condition.
Law Enforcement
Police, as well as tribal authorities, prison authorities, and campus authorities (not an exhaustive list).
Medical Health Care
• Inpatient: Treatment by a physician or other health care professional related to the physical health of the
victim who has been admitted to a hospital or other health care facility.
• Outpatient: Treatment by a physician or other health care professional related to the physical health of
the victim who has not been admitted to a hospital or other health care facility. Includes treatment in an
emergency department.
Mental Health Care
Includes individual or group care by a psychiatrist, psychologist, social worker, or other counselor related to
the mental health of the victim. It may involve inpatient or outpatient treatment. Mental health care excludes
substance abuse treatment. It includes pastoral counseling if such counseling is specifically related to the mental
health of the victim.
Penetration
Penetration involves physical insertion, however slight, of the penis into the vulva; contact between the mouth
and the penis, vulva, or anus; or physical insertion of a hand, finger, or other object into the anal or genital
opening of another person.
• Penetration of Victim
° Penetration of the Victim by Force – Includes completed or attempted unwanted vaginal (for
women), oral, or anal insertion through use of physical force or threats to physically harm toward
or against the victim. Examples include pinning the victim’s arms, using one’s body weight to
prevent movement or escape, use of a weapon or threats of use, and assaulting the victim.
Penetration of Victim by Alcohol/drug-facilitation – Includes completed or attempted unwanted
vaginal (for women), oral, or anal insertion when the victim was unable to consent due to being
too intoxicated (e.g., incapacitation, lack of consciousness, or lack of awareness) through their
voluntary or involuntary use of alcohol or drugs.
• Victim was Made to Penetrate
° Victim was Made to Penetrate a Perpetrator or Someone Else by Force – Includes times when the
victim was made, or there was an attempt to make the victim, sexually penetrate a perpetrator
or someone else without the victim’s consent because the victim was physically forced or
threatened with physical harm. Examples include pinning the victim’s arms, using one’s body
weight to prevent movement or escape, use of a weapon or threats of use, and assaulting the
victim.
° Victim was Made to Penetrate a Perpetrator or Someone Else by Alcohol/drug-facilitation –
Includes times when the victim was made, or there was an attempt to make the victim, sexually
penetrate a perpetrator or someone else without the victim’s consent because the victim was
unable to consent due to being too intoxicated (e.g., incapacitation, lack of consciousness, or
lack of awareness) through their voluntary or involuntary use of alcohol or drugs.
No physically Pressured Unwanted Penetration
Victim was pressured verbally or through intimidation or misuse of authority to consent or acquiesce to being
penetrated. Examples include being worn down by someone who repeatedly asked for sex or showed they were
unhappy; feeling pressured by being lied to, or being told promises that were untrue; having someone threaten
to end a relationship or spread rumors; and sexual pressure due to someone using their influence or authority
(this is not an exhaustive list)
Perpetrator
Person who inflicts the sexual violence
Person in Position of Power, Authority or Trust
Someone such as a teacher, nanny, caregiver, foster care worker, religious leader, counselor, coach, supervisor,
boss or employer (not an exhaustive list). This person can perpetrate against a child (e.g., nanny) or an adult
(e.g., boss toward an employee).
Person Briefly Known
Someone who is known to the victim very briefly. Examples include someone just met, such as a blind date, or
someone just met at a party or bar.
Physical Evidence Collection
Collection of hairs, fibers or specimens of body fluids from a victim’s body or garments that may aid in the
identification of the perpetrator.
Physical Injury
Any physical harm, including death, occurring to the body resulting from exposure to thermal, mechanical,
electrical, or chemical energy interacting with the body in amounts or rates that exceed the threshold of
physiological tolerance, or from the absence of such essentials as oxygen or heat. Examples of physical injuries
are bruises and vaginal or anal tears attributable to an incident of SV.
Physical Violence
The intentional use of physical force with the potential for causing death, disability, injury, or harm. Physical
violence includes, but is not limited to: scratching, pushing, shoving, throwing, grabbing, biting, choking,
shaking, hair-pulling, slapping, punching, hitting, burning, use of a weapon (gun, knife, or other object), and use
of restraints or one’s body, size, or strength against another person. Physical violence also includes coercing
other people to commit any of the above acts.
Pregnancy Impact
Pregnancy resulting from SV or loss of an existing pregnancy following SV.
Psychological Functioning
The intellectual, developmental, emotional, behavioral, or social role functioning of the victim. Changes in
psychological functioning can be either temporary (i.e., persisting for 180 days or less), intermittent, or chronic
(i.e., likely to be of an extended and continuous duration persisting for a period greater than 180 days).
Examples of changes in psychological functioning include increases in or development of anxiety, depression,
insomnia, eating disorders, post-traumatic stress disorder, dissociation, inattention, memory impairment, suicidal
ideation, self-medication, self-mutilation, sexual dysfunction and hypersexuality.
Residential Institution
A location where the victim or perpetrator resides. Includes settings such as a nursing home, a college campus,
a retirement home, or a jail/prison (not an exhaustive list).
Sexual Trafficking
The recruitment, harboring, transportation, provision, or obtaining of a person for the purpose of a commercial
sex act. In order for a situation to be considered trafficking, it must have at least one of the elements within
each of the three criteria of process, means, and goal. If one condition from each criterion is met, the result
is trafficking. For adults, victim consent is irrelevant if one of the means is employed. For children, consent is
irrelevant with or without the means category.16
• Process: Recruitment, transportation, transferring, harboring, or receiving.
• Means: Threat, coercion, abduction, fraud, deceit, deception, or abuse of power.
• Goal: Prostitution, pornography, violence/sexual exploitation, or involuntary sexual servitude.
Stranger
Someone unknown to the victim.
Substance Abuse
Abuse of alcohol or other drugs. This also includes alcohol or other drug dependence.
Substance Abuse Treatment
Any treatment related to alcohol or other drug use, abuse, or dependence.
Tactics
Methods used by the perpetrator to coerce someone to engage in or be exposed to a sexual act. The following
are tactics used to perpetrate SEXUAL VIOLENCE (this is not an exhaustive list):
• Use or threat of physical force toward a victim in order to gain the victim’s compliance with a sexual act
(e.g., pinning the victim down, assaulting the victim)
• Administering alcohol or drugs to a victim in order to gain the victim’s compliance with a sexual act (e.g.,
drink spiking)
• Taking advantage of a victim who is unable to provide consent due to intoxication or incapacitation from
voluntary consumption of alcohol, recreational drugs, or medication
• Exploitation of vulnerability (e.g., immigration status, disability, undisclosed sexual orientation, age)
• Intimidation
• Misuse of authority (e.g., using one’s position of power to coerce or force a person to engage in sexual
activity)
• Economic coercion, such as bartering of sex for basic goods, like housing, employment/wages,
immigration papers, or childcare
• Degradation, such as insulting or humiliating a victim
• Fraud, such as lies or misrepresentation of the perpetrator’s identity
• Continual verbal pressure, such as when the victim is being worn down by someone who repeatedly
asks for sex or, for example, by someone who complains that the victim doesn’t love them enough
• False promises by the perpetrator (e.g., promising marriage, promising to stay in the relationship, etc.)
• Nonphysical threats such as threats to end a relationship or spread rumors
• Grooming and other tactics to gain a child’s trust
• Control of a person’s sexual behavior/sexuality through threats, reprisals, threat to transmit STDs, threat
to force pregnancy, etc.
Victim
Person on whom the sexual violence is inflicted. Survivor is often used as a synonym for a victim who is not deceased.
Victim Advocacy
Services provided by someone trained in violent crime response that usually occurs by phone, in person or in a
hospital setting. The services may include crisis response, information, support and referral
