This study examines trends in adolescent Electronic Media Communication (EMC) and its relationship with ease of communication with friends of the opposite sex, from 2002 to 2010 in 30 European and North American regions. Data from the HBSC study was collected using self-report questionnaires from 11y, 13y, 15y. Findings show that EMC has grown over the years in most of the regions and increases with age. Even though Internet usage is often blamed for its negative effects on teenagers' social interactions in the physical world, in the present study EMC was found to predict ease of communication with friends. Especially, the more they use EMC, the more they find it easy to talk with friends from the opposite sex. Though these findings suggest that EMC reinforces communication, the interaction between year and EMC usage was not significant.
