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The influence of background factors on persistence is widely recognized in the literature. However, the results diverge from one study to another and it is therefore difficult to understand the role these factors play in persistence. Moreover, the impact of these factors is seldom studied jointly. In this context, 812 first-year university students participated in our research, which aimed to study the joint impact of gender and parental education on the persistence process. Multi-group analyses have shown that these factors may have a moderating effect on the relationship between persistence and its determinants, but also that taking into account the joint impact of these two background factors provides us with a better understanding of the phenomenon of persistence.