Welcome to the SAT Living Review!

Access the Living Review

The SAT Living Review is a systematically sourced and screened collation of empirical SAT literature that has been coded, appraised and synthesized, and is updated regularly. As a starting point it includes all literature (pre-2021) encompassed in the two previous SAT literature reviews. These previous review papers include considerable discussion (see further below), which the living review does not. The current version of the living review, v.1.0.0, released on 30th June 2026, builds on previous reviews by including papers published up to 26th May 2026. The next version is intended for release before the end of the year.

It is a searchable, editable, filterable excel database. Researchers can use it to aid their research how they wish, though it should be cited appropriately. The citation for the current version is:

Rose, C., & Hardie, B. (2026). Situational Action Theory Living Review (Version 1) (1.0.0) [Data set]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.21061757

For more information please see the menu below. 

Please note that many SAT publications are not included in the Living Review, such as books, book chapters, theory or methodology papers, and currently, empirical tests of the DEA developmental model of SAT. Inclusion criteria is detailed in the Living Review file. Additional features and inclusion criteria are under consideration for future versions of the Living Review, and in due course, key publications not included in the review will be listed in the Resources section of the Dashboard.

  • Research applying Situational Action Theory (SAT) has generated a substantial and diverse body of empirical work, and a number of existing reviews synthesise various elements of the evidence base (e.g. Hardie & Rose, 2025; Pauwels et al., 2018). However, such reviews are necessarily static and quickly become outdated as new studies emerge. Their fixed format also limits the ability to track how theoretical emphasis, operationalisation, measurement, and analytic practice vary across studies, or how empirical examination of different components of the theory accumulates over time.

    Living systematic reviews have been proposed as one response to these limitations, allowing evidence syntheses to be updated as new research is published (Elliott et al., 2014). While this approach represents an important methodological advance, living reviews typically remain publication-bound and are best suited to relatively homogeneous literatures focused on effect estimation. SAT research is necessarily theory-driven and characterised by conceptual diversity and substantial variation in measurement and analytic practice. Living reviews alone offer limited support for the cumulative theory development and comparative evaluation across studies that SAT research synthesis demands.

    The SAT Dashboard (SATDASH) responds to these limitations by developing a dedicated research platform and dashboard for SAT. Rather than replacing traditional reviews, the SAT Living Review is designed to complement them by providing a structured, continually updateable synthesis of the literature that makes variation in theoretical focus, measurement, and analytic approach transparent and comparable. By enabling researchers to systematically interrogate patterns across studies and to situate new work within the existing evidence base, the SAT Living Review supports cumulative theory development and testing in ways that static or publication-bound reviews cannot, while also facilitating structured knowledge exchange and cross-study comparison across an increasingly international evidence base.

  • The excel file for the living reivew can be downloaded via this link:

    V.1.0.0 release date 30/06/26; review update date 26/05/26

  • Review Covering SAT Studies from 2006 to 2015:

    Pauwels, L. J. R., Svensson, R., & Hirtenlehner, H. (2018). Testing Situational Action Theory: A narrative review of studies published between 2006 and 2015. European Journal of Criminology, 15(1), 32–55. https://doi.org/10.1177/1477370817732185

    • Download Searchable Excel file here

    Review Covering SAT Studies from 2016 to 2020:

    Hardie, B., & Rose, C. (2025). What next for tests of the situational model of Situational Action Theory? Recommendations from a systematic review. European Journal of Criminology, 22(3), 303–345. https://doi.org/10.1177/14773708241306945

    • Download Searchable Excel file here

  • Please follow this link to register

  • If you notice an error or omission, no matter how minor (or major!), please let us know using this form.

  • If you would like to make a suggestion for consideration for a future release (for example, additional fields for coding, a different search criteria or approach, etc), please email satdashteam@gmail.com