Increased age is associated with differences in neural activation when encoding new memories, as well as reduced cortical reinstatement at retrieval. Yet, it remains unclear whether the emotional valence of a memory further moderates these effects. To test this gap in the literature, we analyzed neuroimaging data from a sample of adult participants aged 19-85 years old who incidentally encoded and, after a day delay, retrieved (recognized) positive, negative, and neutral images inside the MRI scanner. Univariate analyses indicate that recapitulation of emotion-related visuosensory neural signatures at retrieval is evident across the adult lifespan, although better preserved for positive than negative memories. These effects may be related to age-related decreases in posterior parietal activation at encoding coupled with increased prefrontal engagement at retrieval when remembering negative content. Collectively, our findings provide a novel assessment of the encoding and retrieval of both positive and negative memories across the adult lifespan.

People must often wait for uncertain and uncontrollable outcomes (e.g., for court proceedings, medical tests). These waiting periods are highly challenging, perhaps because beneficial emotion regulation strategies (e.g., reappraisal) backfire (Moeck et al., 2024). But why do waiting periods elicit this backfiring effect? Here, we investigate the separate and combined effect of perceived uncertainty and controllability on emotion regulation. We surveyed medical students’ 6-times per day for 12-days: 4-days before sitting consequential exams (an uncertain but controllable outcome), 4-days before receiving exam grades (an uncertain and uncontrollable outcome), and 4-days after receiving exam grades (a certain but uncontrollable outcome). Our findings will help identify ways to overcome the impact of uncertainty and uncontrollability on emotion regulation.