The study investigated maintenance of responding by four severely to moderately mentally retarded persons (12 to 16 years old) in a community living center who were taught methods of exiting the house in fire emergency situations. Training included instructions, modeling, behavioral rehearsal, social and tangible external reinforcement, and self reinforcement. To facilitate maintenance, all Ss received isolated, followed by simultaneous, presentation of situations and those Ss who met certain criteria received reinforcement fading and alteration from external to self reinforcement. To increase likelihood of generalization to an actual fire, Ss were taught in their own home and were presented with simulated cues. Generalization to a second room was trained to Ss meeting criteria. Results indicated that the procedure was effective in both training and maintaining emergency exiting skills in the simulated setting. Generalization probe data indicated the need to either program generalization or train children in their own rooms. (Author)