Hi,
An association between a Non-persistable and persiatable must start in the NPE.
Mendix handles the associations as follows
Knowing this, when you have an association between a NP and NPE it must start (dot) at the NPE otherwise the owning entity is the persitable entity. which would result in a join table which stores ID's of objects which will never enter the database. Hence a non-persitable entity cannot be persisted.
Long story short; only association that start in a NPE can be used. A 1-1 association results in ownership at both sides and cannot be used between a NPE and PE
Hope it helps!!