Abstract: Behavioral studies have suggested that recognition, attention and memory for negative emotions declined in older adults while processing of positive emotions remained intact. Neuroimaging studies revealed that, during emotion processing, the activation of limbic system (especially amygdala) in older adults was weaker than their younger counterparts. However, the activation of the frontal cortex was relatively stronger in older adults. Based on these findings, two hypotheses were proposed, namely, the functional compensation and the strategic change hypothesis. The former argued that older adults’ stronger activation in the frontal cortex was to compensate functional decline in the limbic system, hence, reflecting the compensation of brain function. The later proposed that older adults adopted strategies which were different from younger adults. So it was the different patterns of emotion processing that led to different cerebral activities. Finally, the directions of future research and some problems need to be resolved were also discussed

Key words: emotion processing, aging effect, limbic system, frontal cortex, functional compensation, strategic change