This study applies Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) and Word2Vec-based semantic network analysis to explore the elements that contribute to the perception of Animal Crossing: New Horizons as a healing game. User comments were collected, with LDA used to extract latent topics and Word2Vec to analyze semantic associations among key terms. The analysis identified major themes such as gameplay immersion, resource crafting and settlement activities, emotional satisfaction, restoration of daily rhythms, and formation of social relationships. Word2Vec further revealed detailed emotional experiences and activity contexts around key terms like island, craft, relaxing, time, and people. The integrated findings confirmed that Animal Crossing fosters psychological stability and healing experiences across both structural (e.g., spatial creation, task routines) and emotional (e.g., relaxation, social bonding) dimensions. This study also highlights how LDA and Word2Vec can be complementarily applied to user-generated text analysis, demonstrating the methodological potential for expanding natural language processing-based approaches in game user experience research.

This study analyzes research trends in mushrooms using social network analysis (SNA) and Word2Vec analysis based on 654 papers published in the journal of mushrooms. By tracking changes in research trends through centrality indices of key keywords and temporal keyword associations, it was found that in the early period (2011–2015), research primarily focused on optimizing growth conditions. During the mid-period (2016–2020), studies on strain characteristics and disease resistance became more prominent. In the recent period (2021–2024), research on molecular biology and functional components has expanded significantly, with molecular biology research, substrate and cultivation environment studies, and quality and functional food research emerging as new research areas. Meanwhile, research on Pleurotus ostreatus has been the most active, whereas studies on other mushroom species remain relatively limited, indicating the need for a broader scope in future research. This study provides an in-depth review of the research trends and transformations in the journal of mushrooms, contributing to the discussion on its balanced development and future research directions.