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Abstract: Objective:: Because the potential for electronic media communication (EMC) has increased greatly, it is of interest to describe trends in EMC between adolescents and their friends and to investigate whether EMC facilitate or supersede face-to-face contacts among peers. Methods:: Answers of 275,571 adolescents concerning contacting friends by means of the phone, text messages, and the internet (i. e. EMC), the number of close friends, and the number of afternoons and evenings per week spent out with friends were analysed by means of $$\chi^2$$-tests and multiple regression. Results:: In 2006, between more than one third (11-year olds) and nearly two thirds (15-year olds) communicated electronically with their friends daily or nearly daily. From 2002 to 2006, EMC increased in almost all participating countries. Particularly high increases were found in Eastern Europe. Across countries, the higher the frequency of EMC the higher the number of afternoons and evenings spent with friends. Conclusion:: The results are surprisingly consistent across the 31 countries and suggest that EMC among adolescents facilitate rather than supersede face-to-face peer contacts.

The present study examines the prevalence of headache in early adolescents in 21 European and North-American countries and the role of perceived teacher unfairness in predicting this health complaint across different countries.Data were taken from the “Health Behaviour in School-aged Children” study (HBSC), a World Health Organization cross-national survey on health behaviors in 11-, 13- and 15-year-old students. Headache and perceived teacher unfairness were measured through a self-administered questionnaire filled out by 115,212 adolescents.The overall prevalence of frequent headaches (at least once a week) was 28.8%, ranging from 18.9% in Slovenia to 49.4% in Israel. After adjusting for gender, grade, family affluence, school achievement, being bullied and lifestyles (drinking, smoking, eating and physical activity), teacher unfairness showed a significant association with frequent headache in all but two countries (Ukraine and Luxembourg).Our results show that headache is a common health symptom in European and North-American countries, even though there are substantial differences in its prevalence across countries. The study indicates that perceived teacher unfairness can be a significant predictor of frequent headache during adolescence, and this association is consistent across countries.

To examine the relation between income inequality and school bullying (perpetration, victimisation and bully/victims) and explore whether the relation is attributable to international differences in violent crime.Between 1994 and 2006, the Health Behaviour in School-aged Children study surveyed 117 nationally representative samples of adolescents about their involvement in school bullying over the previous 2 months. Country prevalence rates of bullying were matched to data on income inequality and homicides.With time and country differences held constant, income inequality positively related to the prevalence of bullying others at least twice (b= 0.25), victimisation by bullying at least twice (b= 0.29) and both bullied and victimisation at least twice (b= 0.40). The relation between income inequality and victimisation was partially mediated by country differences in homicides.Understanding the social determinants of school bullying facilitates anti-bullying policy by identifying groups at risk and exposing its cultural and economic influences. This study found that cross-national differences in income inequality related to the prevalence of school bullying in most age and gender groups due, in part, to a social milieu of interpersonal violence.