1. 
[syn: abusive, opprobrious, scurrilous]
2.  characterized by physical or psychological maltreatment; 
- Example: "abusive punishment"
- Example: "argued...that foster homes are abusive"
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:
Abusive \A*bu"sive\, a. [Cf. F. abusif, fr. L. abusivus.]
   1. Wrongly used; perverted; misapplied.
      [1913 Webster]
            I am . . . necessitated to use the word Parliament
            improperly, according to the abusive acceptation
            thereof.                              --Fuller.
      [1913 Webster]
   2. Given to misusing; also, full of abuses. [Archaic] "The
      abusive prerogatives of his see." --Hallam.
      [1913 Webster]
   3. Practicing abuse; prone to ill treat by coarse, insulting
      words or by other ill usage; as, an abusive author; an
      abusive fellow.
      [1913 Webster]
   4. Containing abuse, or serving as the instrument of abuse;
      vituperative; reproachful; scurrilous. "An abusive
      lampoon." --Johnson.
      [1913 Webster]
   5. Tending to deceive; fraudulent; cheating. [Obs.] "An
      abusive treaty." --Bacon.
      [1913 Webster]
   Syn: Reproachful; scurrilous; opprobrious; insolent;
        insulting; injurious; offensive; reviling.
        [1913 Webster]
WordNet (r) 3.0 (2006):
abusive
    adj 1: expressing offensive reproach [syn: abusive,
           opprobrious, scurrilous]
    2: characterized by physical or psychological maltreatment;
       "abusive punishment"; "argued...that foster homes are
       abusive"
Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0:
122 Moby Thesaurus words for "abusive":
   Rabelaisian, atrocious, back-biting, backhand, backhanded,
   belittling, bitchy, blackening, blameful, blasphemous, bludgeoning,
   blustering, browbeating, brutal, bulldozing, bullying,
   calumniatory, calumnious, catty, censorious, comminatory,
   condemnatory, contemptuous, contumelious, corrupt, crooked, cruel,
   cursing, damnatory, defamatory, degrading, denunciatory,
   deprecative, deprecatory, depreciative, depreciatory, derisive,
   derisory, derogative, derogatory, destructive, detractory, dirty,
   dishonest, disparaging, dysphemistic, epithetic, excommunicative,
   excommunicatory, execrating, execrative, execratory,
   fear-inspiring, filthy, foreboding, foul, fulminatory, harmful,
   hectoring, humiliating, hurtful, imminent, imprecatory, improper,
   incorrect, injurious, insolent, insulting, intimidating, invective,
   inveighing, judgmental, left-handed, libelous, lowering,
   maledictory, maligning, menacing, minacious, minatory, minimizing,
   misapplied, objurgatory, obscene, odious, offending, offensive,
   ominous, opprobrious, outrageous, pejorative, perverted, priggish,
   profane, raw, reproachful, reprobative, reviling, ribald,
   ridiculing, risque, rude, scandalous, scatologic, scoffing,
   scurrile, scurrilous, slanderous, slighting, smutty, terroristic,
   terrorizing, threatening, threatful, truculent, unspeakable, venal,
   vile, vilifying, vituperative, vulgar, wrong