Mahmudah, Sultan, Nurhusna, Muh. Bahly Basri
Technological advancement has transformed how young people communicate in digital environments, potentially influencing the existence of the Indonesian language. This study fills a research gap by examining young people's attitudes toward the Indonesian language based on their level of technological proficiency, exploring the cognitive, affective, and behavioral aspects. The research employed a cross-sectional survey design. A total of 1,338 young adults (aged 18-23) who were university students from various fields of study across nine public and private universities in Indonesia were included as the research sample. The findings show that the level of technological proficiency significantly affects all dimensions across the cognitive (useful, important, educated), affective (connected, comfortable, attractive), and behavioral (study, use, media, class) aspects. Students with a very high level of technological proficiency consistently achieved the highest scores across all dimensions of cognitive and affective aspects. In the behavioral aspect, students with very high proficiency achieved the highest scores in the media and class dimensions, whereas those with very low proficiency scored slightly higher in the study and use dimensions. These findings confirm that technological proficiency is a key factor in strengthening young people's cognition, affection, and behavior toward the Indonesian language in the digital era. The theoretical contribution of this research expands the scope of language attitude theory by introducing technological proficiency as a new mediating variable. Practically, the results of this study provide a basis for designing integrative language strategies and digital literacy policies. © 2026, Slovenska Vzdelavacia Obstaravacia. All rights reserved.
Department of Indonesian Language and Literature, Faculty of Languages and Literature, Universitas Negeri Makassar, Indonesia Daeng Tata Raya Street, South Sulawesi, Makassar, Indonesia
