Teaching developmentally disabled persons how to react to fires.

Abstract

Four elements of fire reaction are delineated: investigating, reporting, suppressing, and evacuating areas in which fires are present. Important issues in the acquisition, maintenance, and generalization of fire reaction skills for developmentally disabled persons are identified and reviewed. Learning-based treatment strategies and fire safety literature relevant to the authors' concerns are reviewed. The authors suggest that behavioral research on training should be congruent with fire safety experts' recommendations on fire reaction skills.