Quality of Life and Sustainability: The End of Quality at Any Price

In this chapter the evolution and structuring role of QoL in environmental psychology research is reviewed. How the conception of the concept has changed is highlighted. Initially, QoL was pursued as an environmental quality to be attained at any price (i.e. regardless of the economic and the environmental costs), but more recent conceptions emphasize the need for quality from the standpoint of sustainability, just as much economic as social and environmental. Another aspect evolving over time concerns the factors that affect QoL, i.e. the shift from an almost exclusive emphasis on the ‘objective’ socioeconomic and environmental conditions to an active and decisive consideration of the subjective, experiential dimension, which inevitably brings us to the study of happiness.