How Does Digital Finance Affect the Household Quality of Life? A Text Mining-Based Sentiment Analysis

This research explores the impact of digital finance on household quality of life (QoL) through a novel quantitative text mining and sentiment analysis methodology. The research aims to systemically assess the sentiment within academic literature regarding digital finance’s effects on QoL, hypothesizing that this sentiment distribution regarding the impacts of digital finance can effectively mirror its positive or negative consequences on the QoL for households. Methodologically, this research extracts data from 175 scholarly articles in the Social Sciences Citation Index, utilizing the 2023 Loughran-McDonald Master Dictionary for sentiment analysis conducted via R language. The results indicate a broad spectrum of sentiment, from positive to negative impacts, with a generally positive average sentiment score suggesting an overall beneficial influence of digital finance on QoL. Notably, positive sentiments largely pertain to enhanced accessibility and efficiency of financial services, whereas negative sentiments focus on privacy risks and market exclusivity. The novelty of this research lies in its application of text mining to synthesize existing sentiment, providing a comprehensive overview that supports policy formulation aimed at maximizing the benefits of the impact of digital finance on the household QoL while mitigating its drawbacks. © 2025 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.