| Summary: | The present manuscript synthesizes research using pupillometry to assess cognitive and affective processing in the aging population. There are two main findings: first, pupil size tends to enlarge as the cognitive load increases in older adults and a contrasting trend emerges when the load surpasses the capacity of the working memory, resulting in a reduction of pupil size; second, the processing of positive information typically reduces pupil size in older adults, suggesting the limited cognitive resources required for attending to positive content, while negative information increases pupil size, reflecting the cognitive effort required to regulate the emotional impact of negative information. Attention is drawn to the physiological mechanisms driving pupil reactivity during cognitive and affective processing in the aging population. The article also pinpoints the technical intricacies of using pupillometry to investigate cognitive and affective processing. In sum, it demonstrates the contribution of pupillometry as a reliable indicator for tracking cognitive and affective processing in the context of aging.
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