We present a general and natural framework to study the dynamics of composition operators on spaces of measurable functions, in which we then reconsider the characterizations for hypercyclic and mixing composition operators obtained by Bayart, Darji and Pires. We show that the notions of hypercyclicity and weak mixing coincide in this context and, if the system is dissipative, the recurrent composition operators agree with the hypercyclic ones. We also give a characterization for invertible composition operators satisfying Kitai’s Criterion, and we construct an example of a mixing composition operator not satisfying Kitai’s Criterion. For invertible dissipative systems with bounded distortion we show that composition operators satisfying Kitai’s Criterion coincide with the mixing operators.