The presence of increasing numbers of students from the People's Republic of China in American graduate and professional schools provides the opportunity for a natural experiment testing one broadly-accepted explanation of gender differences in American context. A study was conducted to examine whether these students, arriving from an educational system in which pedagogic philosophy and political ideology emphasize group rather than individual achievement, experience in American institutions the same conflicts as American women are hypothesized to experience when individualistic achievement striving comes into conflict with affiliative needs. This preliminary study involved qualitatively rich interviews with seven female and six male Chinese graduate students from the People's Republic. An analytic model in which prior socialization and the perceived attitudes of peers toward achievement striving act upon the importance the individual places upon personal versus group achievement was assessed. Subjects were found to be highly achievement-oriented, with men exhibiting somewhat lower levels of personal achievement orientation and somewhat higher levels of peer orientation than women. A modest but consistent tendency for those who rated their own achievement highly to report a higher level of positive accommodation and a lower level of anxiety than students who did not rate their achievement highly was observed. No evidence was found of a relationship between group orientation and adjustment and accommodation measures. (Author/NB)