Improving housing design appertains to architects who are concerned with safety and suitability for the building’s users. To reduce accidents, the improved design should demonstrate how dwellers operate in the everyday use of buildings and their movement inside their dwellings. To design we have to understand human behavior, which is complicated. The objective of this paper is to show how perception has anything to do with livability and safety. An understanding of the nature of perception’s selectivity processes can lead to improving housing design. Safety and livability are dependent on perception. The role of the architect is to achieve a higher sense of safety and a higher quality of livability by understanding underlying psychological and physiological mechanisms of sensory perception.