The effect of neuroticism on depressive symptoms in Chinese college students: maternal parenting practices as moderators

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Background Depressive symptoms is extremely prevalent in college students nowadays. It can cause long-term suffering and may even lead to suicidal ideation. It has been indicated by research that depression is related to a variety of psychosocial factors, the most notable being neuroticism and parenting. However, the underlying mechanisms of these variables have remained unclear. The purpose of the current study was to investigate the interaction between maternal parenting practices and neuroticism and its effects on depression. Method A total of 2,692 undergraduate students were enrolled in this cross-sectional investigation from four universities located in Shandong Province, China. Participants filled simplified versions of the Big Five Personality Inventory, Parental Bonding Instrument, and Self-Rating Depressive Symptoms Scale. After eliminating entries with incomplete values, the dataset comprised 2,588 complete responses for analysis. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was performed using SPSS 22.0 and the PROCESS macro for data analysis. Results The results indicated that both neuroticism ( r = 0.572, p < 0.001) and maternal control factor ( r = 0.253, p < 0.001) displayed strong positive correlation with depression; whereas maternal care factor ( r = −0.402, p < 0.001) and maternal encouraging autonomy factor ( r = −0.345, p < 0.001) are negatively correlated with depression. Additionally, neuroticism demonstrated a significant direct effect on depression (β = 0.571, p < 0.001). Moderation models were employed to examine the relationship between depression, maternal parenting practices, and neuroticism. Specifically, a high level of maternal care (Δ R 2 = 0.001, p = 0.046) and maternal encouraging autonomy (Δ R 2 = 0.0046, p = 0.004) significantly weakened the connections between neuroticism and depression, while an elevated level of maternal control enhanced the relationship between neuroticism and depression (Δ R 2 = 0.0019, p = 0.038). Conclusion This study presents initial evidence for the moderating role of maternal parenting practices in the neuroticism-depression association. These results may facilitate the development of targeted intervention protocols tailored to university student subgroups based on different socioeconomic demographic characteristics and personality profiles.