In the light of sustainable development requirements, environmental psychology has an increasing roleto play in addressing people–environment congruity. People–environment congruity refers to theinterrelation between the individual and his or her (especially: residential) environment, considering thematch between individual life satisfaction and objective standards of living. Promoting human wellbeingrequires looking beyond singular effects of environmental features and considering people’soverall relationship to their environment. This leads us to look at the residential environment as theplace where people–environment congruity is crucial, and to propose a framework of analyses of theconditions of congruity between objective and subjective assessment of environmental stressors inrelation to the individual and social expression of well-being. The paper concludes with the implicationsof people–environment congruity for research and policy-making about sustainable development. 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.