Flow is a satisfying state of deep engagement and absorption that individuals experience when faced with a challenging activity and in the process feel they have sufficient skills to handle it (EFRN, 2014). The flow concept was introduced by Csikszentmihalyi in 1975 and interest in flow research is increasing. However, to our knowledge, no scoping review exists yet that systematically looks at studies on flow published between 2000 and 2016. A total of 252 studies are included in this review. Our review (1) provides a framework to cluster flow research, (2) provides a systematic review of existing studies and their findings, and (3) offers insights for future research.

The proposed framework consists of three levels of flow research. The first level, the “Individual” level, includes categories such as personality, motivation, physiology, emotion, cognition and behavior. The second level, the “Contextual” level, includes categories for contextual and inter-individual factors. The third level, the “Cultural” level, includes cultural factors related to flow. Using this framework, we systematically present findings by category. Although flow research has made progress in understanding flow, more experimental and longitudinal studies are needed in the future to gain deeper insights into the causal structure of flow and the factors that precede or result from it.