A study examined the differences and similarities in the relationship between the organization of written English produced by native Chinese, English, and Spanish speaking adult college students when they wrote in the narrative and expository modes. Specifically, the study explored the kinds of cohesive devices that operated in the English text and determined the presence of these devices in the subjects' writing. Subjects, 30 Chinese, 30 English, and 30 Spanish speaking students, produced 180 writing samples. The City University of New York (CUNY) writing Assessment Test was used to select the subjects, while the Milic Logical Categories test and a cohesion scale were used to analyze their writing. Results indicated that (1) there was a distinct organizational structure in the writing samples of all students, (2) the organizational structure was produced across modes, (3) the frequency and percentage of use of cohesive devices were distinct for each language group, and (4) the three language groups produced more sentences and used more devices when writing in the narrative than in the expository mode. A three-page list of references and data tables are included. (FL)