How to Prevent Domestic Abuse: Warning Signs and Legal Tools

Preventing domestic abuse starts with two things you can actually do: learn to recognize the warning signs early, and know how to respond safely — whether you’re worried about your own relationship, someone else’s, or your community. Research from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows that abuse is preventable when healthy relationship skills, protective environments, and economic supports come together. If you or someone you know needs help right now, the National Domestic Violence Hotline is available 24/7 at 800-799-7233, or by texting “START” to 88788.

Learn to Spot the Warning Signs

Abuse rarely announces itself. The National Domestic Violence Hotline describes the underlying pattern as one partner working to establish power and control over the other, often gradually. An abusive person may seem attentive or ideal at first, and the controlling behavior intensifies over time.

Behaviors the Hotline and the National Network to End Domestic Violence identify as red flags include:

Isolation from friends, family, school, or work, often driven by extreme jealousy.
Monitoring a partner’s location, finances, or daily decisions; withholding money for necessities.
Constant criticism, belittling, or the claim that no one else would love them.
Threats against the victim, children, or pets; destroying belongings; using weapons to intimidate.
Pressuring a partner into unwanted sexual activity.
Refusing responsibility and blaming the victim for the abuser’s behavior.
Moving the relationship unusually fast and ignoring requests to slow down.

Two subtler patterns often go unnamed. Selective rage: the abuser only loses control with the victim, staying composed with everyone else. And financial abuse: sabotaging a partner’s employment, running up debt in their name, or controlling all access to money.¹²

If You Think Someone You Know Is Being Abused

You do not have to physically confront anyone to help. The Montgomery County Family Justice Center recommends three approaches for bystanders:³

Distract. Interrupt a tense moment with a neutral question — asking to borrow something, or for directions.
Delegate. If stepping in yourself feels unsafe, tell an authority figure, a staff member, or call 911.
Document. Note dates, times, and what you observed. Share the record only with the person being abused, never on social media.

For friends and family of someone in an abusive relationship, Women’s Aid and the Washington State Coalition Against Domestic Violence emphasize listening without judgment, avoiding ultimatums that could isolate the person further, and staying in contact even when they aren’t ready to leave. Confronting the abuser directly is discouraged; it can escalate the danger to the person you’re trying to help.⁴⁵

Bystander education works. In nine studies reviewed by the Community Preventive Services Task Force, programs that trained people to intervene led to consistent increases in bystander action within six months.⁶

Make a Safety Plan

A safety plan is a personalized set of steps to reduce risk, whether someone is still in the relationship, preparing to leave, or already out. The National Domestic Violence Hotline offers an interactive online tool, and local domestic violence organizations can help build one in person.⁷

Common elements include:

During an incident: stay in rooms with exits, keep keys and a phone within reach, and set up a code word with trusted contacts to signal a need for emergency help.⁸
Preparing to leave: secure important documents, open a separate bank account, obtain a prepaid phone the abuser doesn’t know about, and keep a packed bag at a trusted person’s home.
After leaving: change locks, vary daily routes, inform schools and employers, and carry a copy of any restraining order at all times.

WomensLaw.org offers tailored guidance for specific situations — living with an abuser, being stalked, having children, or navigating court — as well as digital security resources through TechSafety.org.⁹

Digital Safety Is Part of the Plan

The New York State Office for the Prevention of Domestic Violence reports that the vast majority of domestic violence situations now involve some form of technology-facilitated abuse: GPS tracking, message flooding, misuse of stolen passwords, and non-consensual sharing of intimate images.¹⁰

Australia’s eSafety Commissioner recommends using private browsing to research resources, clearing browser history, turning off Bluetooth and location services when not needed, enabling two-factor authentication, and choosing strong, unique passwords with non-identifiable security questions. The Commissioner also warns that if an abuser discovers safety-related browsing, the danger can escalate, so digital caution itself is a safety measure.¹¹

Programs That Prevent Abuse Before It Starts

Prevention at the population level means reaching people — especially young people — before abusive patterns take hold. The CDC frames intimate partner violence as a public health problem and identifies six core prevention strategies.¹²

Teach Healthy Relationship Skills to Young People

Several school-based programs have strong evidence behind them:

Safe Dates, a ten-session curriculum for middle and high school students developed at the University of North Carolina. A randomized trial across 14 schools found reductions of 56 to 92 percent in physical and sexual dating violence perpetration and victimization at a four-year follow-up.¹³
Dating Matters, a CDC model for ages 11 to 14 that combines school curricula, parent programs, educator training, and community activities. A multi-site trial across 46 middle schools found it more effective at preventing teen dating violence than single-program approaches.¹⁴¹⁵
Coaching Boys Into Men, which trains high school athletic coaches to hold brief weekly discussions on respect and bystander intervention. A cluster-randomized trial of more than 1,500 athletes found less dating violence perpetration and fewer negative bystander behaviors twelve months later.¹⁶

The Community Preventive Services Task Force, drawing on 28 studies, recommends primary prevention programs for ages 12 to 24 that pair education with at least one of three strategies: teaching healthy relationship skills, promoting protective social norms, or creating protective environments.⁶

Strengthen Economic Supports

Financial stress and economic dependence are established risk factors. Research from the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab found that unconditional cash or food transfers reduced intimate partner violence by 19 to 52 percent across two randomized evaluations, and that young women in South Africa who received cash transfers tied to school attendance experienced a 34 percent reduction in physical violence.¹⁷

The effect isn’t uniform. In Mexico, large cash transfers to women led to increased aggression from some partners, while smaller transfers reduced violence by 37 percent. Researchers recommend pairing economic programs with monitoring and support services so women at risk of retaliation can be identified and protected.¹⁷

Build Protective Community Environments

The CDC’s DELTA AHEAD program, launched in March 2023, funds 13 state-level domestic violence coalitions to carry out community-level prevention with a focus on health equity, particularly in rural communities and among indigenous populations. Recipients span from Alaska to Tennessee.¹⁸¹⁹ Early childhood interventions such as home visitation and parenting programs can also disrupt developmental pathways to later violence.¹²

Legal Tools That Stop Ongoing Abuse

Protective Orders

A protective order, sometimes called a restraining order, is a court order that can require an abuser to stop contact, stay away from a home or workplace, vacate a shared residence, and surrender firearms. Orders can also address child custody, spousal support, and pet custody. Details vary by state, but the process generally involves filing a petition, receiving a temporary order (often within 24 hours), and attending a hearing where a judge decides on a longer-term order.

In California, there is no fee to file a domestic violence restraining order, no lawyer is required, and people as young as 12 can file on their own. A judge usually rules on a temporary order the same or next business day, and after a hearing can grant an order lasting up to five years.²⁰ In Maryland, interim protective orders are available around the clock through District Court commissioners, and final orders can last up to one year after a hearing where the petitioner must prove abuse by a preponderance of the evidence.²¹

Firearm Surrender

Federal law prohibits anyone subject to a qualifying protective order from possessing a firearm, and protective orders often include a surrender provision. Enforcement varies widely. A study in King County, Washington, found that after a dedicated enforcement unit was created, protection orders were at least 4.5 times more likely to include a weapons surrender requirement, and respondents were at least 3.4 times more likely to comply.²² Nationally, a 2024 study found that as of January 2023, 31 states had laws requiring or allowing courts to order firearm relinquishment, but only 13 unconditionally required all respondents to give up their weapons.²³

Coercive Control Laws

Traditional domestic violence laws focused on physical harm, leaving patterns of psychological and financial control outside their reach. That is changing. Hawaii became the first state to explicitly include coercive control in its definition of domestic abuse in 2020. California’s Senate Bill 1141, passed the same year, allows courts to consider coercive control when issuing civil protective orders and creates a presumption against awarding custody to a perpetrator. Connecticut followed in 2021 with Jennifer’s Law, and Massachusetts expanded its abuse prevention order protections in 2024.²⁴²⁵ In New York, legislation to classify coercive control as a Class E felony has been introduced every session since 2019.²⁶

Workplace Protections

In California, employers with 25 or more employees must allow survivors up to 12 weeks of leave for protected activities and must engage in an interactive process to provide reasonable safety accommodations, such as modifying workstations, changing phone numbers, or adjusting schedules, unless doing so would create undue hardship. Retaliation is prohibited and documentation must be kept confidential.²⁷ Pittsburgh has made survivor status a protected class in its human rights code, so employers cannot discriminate in hiring, pay, or termination based on someone’s experience of domestic violence.²⁸

The federal Violence Against Women Act, first enacted in 1994 and reauthorized in 2022, establishes federal crimes for crossing state lines to injure an intimate partner, stalk, or violate a protective order, and funds transitional housing, legal assistance, rural victim programs, tribal programs, and sexual assault services.²⁹

Where to Get Help Now

Several confidential resources are available to anyone experiencing abuse, worried about someone else, or looking for more information:

National Domestic Violence Hotline: 800-799-7233, text “START” to 88788, or chat at thehotline.org. Available 24/7 in over 200 languages.³⁰
StrongHearts Native Helpline: 844-762-8483, for Native Americans and Alaska Natives.³¹
National Teen Dating Abuse Helpline: 866-331-9474, or text “LOVEIS” to 22522.
The Deaf Hotline: 855-812-1001 (video phone).
National Sexual Assault Hotline: 800-656-4673.
988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline: call or text 988.

In an emergency, call 911.

1
National Domestic Violence Hotline. Domestic Abuse Warning Signs
2
National Network to End Domestic Violence. Red Flags of Abuse
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Montgomery County Family Justice Center. Bystander Intervention
4
Women’s Aid. I’m Worried About Someone Else
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Washington State Coalition Against Domestic Violence. Friends and Family Guide
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National Domestic Violence Hotline. Create Your Personal Safety Plan
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Oregon Judicial Department. Domestic Violence Safety Plan
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10
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eSafety Commissioner. Reduce Technology-Facilitated Abuse
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Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Dating Matters
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ScienceDirect. Coaching Boys Into Men Evaluation
17
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People’s Law Library of Maryland. Protective Orders
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Wiley Online Library. Firearm Restrictions in Domestic Violence Protection Orders
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The Marshall Project. Redefining Domestic Violence: Coercive Control
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American Bar Association. Redefining Domestic Abuse: Coercive Control
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New York State Senate. Bill A679
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California Civil Rights Department. Survivors’ Right to Time Off FAQs
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City of Pittsburgh. Guidance for Employers on Survivors of Domestic Violence
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U.S. Department of Justice. Federal Domestic Violence Laws
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National Domestic Violence Hotline. The Hotline
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Administration for Children and Families. ACF Hotlines and Helplines