The goal of persuasion is to change the behaviour or the attitude of a person without using any form of coercion (Oinas et al. 2010). In the last ten years, several models, approaches and theories have been developed in the research field of persuasion, producing a copious scientific literature. Different reviews of the state-of-the-art focusing on specific aspects have been proposed. Pindel et al. (Pinder et al. 2018) for example analyse the state of the art under the perspective of the mechanisms that lead to the habit forming. In this work, we report a state-of-the-art review on the key elements of the process of change using the concepts of states, transitions, and determinants to propose a common generic paradigm. We conclude with a discussion about the operationalization of persuasive processes and with a comparative analysis on the reviewed theories.