Does parental education moderate the association between personal growth initiative, purpose in life and subjective well-being among Chinese college students?

We investigated the moderating effect of parental education on the relationship between personal growth initiative, purpose in life, and subjective well-being. Two-wave time-lagged data with an interval of three months were collected from 491 students (mean age = 19.58 years, SD = 1.26 years) attending two vocational colleges in the Zhejiang and Henan provinces of China. Hierarchical regression analysis and bootstrapping analysis (resampling times = 5 000) were conducted to test the hypothetical model. The results showed that personal growth initiative positively predicted a student's subjective well-being, and purpose in life partially mediated this relationship for a higher subjective well-being. Additionally, the education level of the mother moderated the relationship between personal growth initiative and purpose in life such that this relationship was stronger when the mother's level of education was high. The finding aligns with the theory of class distinction regarding the role of the family in the quality of college students' school life. By implication, the findings highlight the importance of family in personal growth initiatives and purpose in life among college students in promoting their subjective well-being.