Neural correlates of emotional false memory in healthy elderly and mild cognitive impairment

False memory (FM) occurs in both healthy individuals and in patients with Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) and is often influenced by stimuli's emotional content and individuals' mood. The present study investigated the impact of emotional content on FM and its neural correlates in healthy elderly (HP) and in patients with MCI also exploring the relationship between FM and depressive symptoms. All participants performed an adapted version of the Deese-Roediger-McDermott word recognition paradigm while their cortical activity was evaluated by functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS). The results showed higher recognition accuracy in HP compared to MCI. Positive emotional content increased semantic FM in HP only. fNIRS results showed greater right-temporal activity compared to medial-frontal regions in HP, whereas MCI showed no regional differences. In both groups, participants prone to produce semantic FM showed higher fronto-temporal activation. Exploratory analyses indicated that subclinical depressive symptoms in MCI were associated with memory bias for depression-related words, though overall depressive scores were not correlated with brain activation. These findings highlight the interplay between emotion, memory, and neural activity in ageing, emphasizing the importance of considering mood in cognitive assessment and early intervention.