Role stressors and employees' continuing education participation tendency: the mediating role of person–job fit and the moderating role of proactive personality

Against a backdrop of accelerated knowledge renewal, rapidly changing job requirements, and increasingly demanding performance standards, continuing education has become an important means for employees to maintain professional competence and for organizations to sustain competitive advantage. Yet demanding work contexts do not necessarily strengthen employees' continuing education participation tendency. Drawing on person–job fit theory, this study defines person–job fit as employees' evaluation of the compatibility between their abilities and job requirements. It examines how three role stressors—role conflict, role ambiguity, and role overload—relate to continuing education participation tendency among employees in for-profit enterprises through this fit evaluation and whether proactive personality moderates the relationship. A three-wave time-lagged survey yielded 335 valid matched responses. When the three role stressors were entered simultaneously, each significantly and negatively predicted person–job fit. Person–job fit significantly and positively predicted continuing education participation tendency and produced significant indirect effects between each role stressor and this tendency. Proactive personality significantly strengthened the positive relationship between person–job fit and continuing education participation tendency. By incorporating continuing education participation tendency into role-stressor research, this study identifies a cognitive appraisal pathway through which role stressors relate to a future-oriented developmental learning tendency and clarifies the boundary role of proactive personality.