Neurocognitive Shifts in Language Processing Across the Lifespan

Language is not a fixed ability — it evolves with us. Recent advances in cognitive neuroscience and lifespan psychology reveal that the way we understand and produce language undergoes continuous reorganization from early childhood through older age. Behavioral, electrophysiological, eye-tracking, and neuroimaging studies have documented changes in comprehension, production, and lexical processing that reflect both neural adaptation and cognitive resilience. These shifts are shaped by the interplay between neurobiological maturation or decline, lifelong learning, and individual patterns of engagement with language-rich environments.

This Research Topic seeks to advance an integrative understanding of how language is represented, processed, and maintained throughout the lifespan. By combining behavioral experiments with neuroimaging, electrophysiological (e.g., ERP, EEG), and eye-tracking methodologies, we aim to capture both the temporal and spatial dynamics underlying linguistic function. This multi-method approach allows for a more comprehensive account of how the brain and mind jointly adapt to age-related cognitive and neural changes.

The overarching goal is to identify the behavioral, cognitive, and neurophysiological mechanisms that sustain linguistic performance across adulthood, elucidate the compensatory and plastic processes that support communication, and link these insights to real-world linguistic functioning. This initiative encourages contributions that connect neural architecture, cognitive processes, and language behavior across diverse ages and contexts.

We welcome studies addressing, but not limited to, the following themes:

• Behavioral, electrophysiological, and neuroimaging markers of language comprehension and production across the adult lifespan
• Functional reorganization and compensatory neural mechanisms supporting linguistic performance in aging
• Eye-tracking investigations of reading, prediction, and attention across age groups
• The role of cognitive engagement, literacy, and bilingual experience in maintaining language abilities
• Interactions between neurobiological change, cognitive control, and linguistic plasticity
• Human–AI linguistic interactions and lifespan-adaptive language technologies
• Methodological and analytical advances for integrative, cumulative lifespan language science

Article types and fees

This Research Topic accepts the following article types, unless otherwise specified in the Research Topic description:

• Brief Research Report
• Case Report
• Clinical Trial
• Community Case Study
• Conceptual Analysis
• Data Report
• Editorial
• FAIR² Data
• FAIR² DATA Direct Submission
• ... View all formats

Articles that are accepted for publication by our external editors following rigorous peer review incur a publishing fee charged to Authors, institutions, or funders.

Article types

This Research Topic accepts the following article types, unless otherwise specified in the Research Topic description:

• Brief Research Report
• Case Report
• Clinical Trial
• Community Case Study
• Conceptual Analysis
• Data Report
• Editorial
• FAIR² Data
• FAIR² DATA Direct Submission
• General Commentary
• Hypothesis and Theory
• Methods
• Mini Review
• Opinion
• Original Research
• Perspective
• Policy and Practice Reviews
• Registered Report
• Review
• Study Protocol
• Systematic Review
• Technology and Code

Keywords: Language Processing, Language and Ageing, language comprehension, linguistic performance

Important note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.