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Legal terms that confuse people

What are the most common terms that people mistakenly use for their legal problem? They use one legal term but actually are talking about another situation.

In our recent Legal Help Online Cohort meeting, we asked the question: what are legal terms that people often get confused? Where they say one term-of-art, but actually mean another situation?

These high-confusion terms are important. People could rely on the wrong information if they are visiting web pages or following guides for the wrong term.

Here are the legal terms that people get confused by:

  1. guardianship vs conservatorship
  2. joint custody vs legal custody
  3. parenting time vs visitation
  4. expunction vs expungement vs record-sealing vs record-masking vs clearing a record
  5. separation vs divorce
  6. restraining orders vs protective orders
  7. custody vs legal decision-making vs parenting time

Do you know other terms that confuse people? We’d love to hear them — so we can devise strategies that help people learn what their situation is actually called.

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