# The Impact of Digital Safety Competence on Cognitive Competence, AI Self-Efficacy, and Character
## 4 Discussion  
The purpose of the present study was to investigate the impact of DSC on student higher-order thinking and AI-related outcomes. In general, our findings indicated that DSC has a positive impact on students' outcomes. Consistent with past studies, DSC was significantly related to cognitive competence, AI self-efficacy, moral competence, and AI ethics. In line with past research, we hypothesized that DSC is positively related to cognitive competence (Hypothesis 1). The results of present study support the hypothesis by suggesting that students with higher DSC are more proficient in engaging higher-order thinking, such as synthesizing, logical reasoning, and self-evaluation. The benefits of DC on cognitive abilities have been supported in high school and tertiary education [54; 84]. Cognitive competence is a multi-dimensional concept that encompasses logical reasoning, self-evaluation, questioning, synthesizing, and inferences [51; 85]. It involves understanding problems, applying purposeful thinking, analyzing situations, and evaluating alternative solutions or strategies [86]. Our findings suggested that digital safety competence encourages students to actively search for suitable digital tools, monitor their learning progress, and evaluate their performance. The results of the present study added to the existing work by showing the impacts of DSC on cognitive abilities. The literature consistently demonstrated DC as a pivotal factor in developing cognitive skills. For example, [PERSON] et al. [87] found a positive relationship between DL and cognitive engagement, while [PERSON] et al. [86] illustrated that students with high DC tend to show cognitive flexibility and higher critical thinking skills. Similarly, [PERSON] et al. [88] identified significant correlations between technology-oriented learning and cognitive engagement, thereby contributing to students' academic success. [PERSON] et al. (p. 12, [58]) noted that \"the reflective and constructive processes of knowledge acquisition through human-computer interaction\" foster autonomous and meaningful learning experiences which in turn promotes further learning engagement. Clearly, the present study extends the literature by highlighting the role of DSC on cognitive competence in tertiary education. In support with our Hypothesis 2, the present study demonstrated that DSC has a positive and significant impact on AI self-efficacy. The importance of self-efficacy is well-supported in the literature. Students with low self-efficacy exhibited diminished learning motivation and less effective development of computational skills compared to their high \begin{table}
\begin{tabular}{c c c c c} \hline \hline  & **Model 1** & **Model 2** & \
\begin{tabular}{c} **Estimate** \\ **(Linear Term)** \\ \end{tabular} &
\begin{tabular}{c} **Estimate** \\ **(Quadratic Term)** \\ \end{tabular} \\ \hline Cognitive competence & & & & \\ AIC & 259.81 & 259.39 & \(-\)0.79 & 0.12 * \\ BIC & 262.86 & 262.44 & & \\ Moral competence & & & & \\ AIC & 279.66 & 276.62 & \(-\)1.22 & 0.17 * \\ BIC & 282.72 & 279.67 & & \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular} Model 1: linear term only; Model 2: both linear and quadratic terms; * \(p\) = 0.01; * \(p\) < 0.05.  
\end{table} 
Table 2: Results of linear mixed modeling for competence variables. self-efficacy counterparts [74, 89]. As hypothesized, DSC significantly predicted AI self-efficacy. This is consistent with findings by [PERSON] et al. [58], who reported that digital self-efficacy was related to learning satisfaction, continuance intention, and perceived usefulness when using GenAI. Similarly, [PERSON] et al. [87] observed that digital self-efficacy is positively correlated with emotional engagement, which, in turn, promotes student satisfaction [90] and academic achievement [91].