<正> This paper is a preliminary study ofhow native Chinese speakers’s intonationpatterns differ from that of American stu-dents who are learning Chinese as a sec-ond language. To limit the size of theanalysis, the focus is placed on simple in-terrogative sentences with particle "吗" atthe end. The result of the comparison andanalysis of the utterances by four testees[two native Chinese and two Americanstudents]indicate that the intonation con-tour of this kind of interrogative sentenceis on the whole flat and slight falling atthe end. Apart from the sandhi-rule, tonepitch in a sentence may vary in terms ofpitch range and fundamental frequency[Fo]. The American students tend tochange the feature of a tone pitch of a syl-lable to make it stressed, unstressed, riseor fall. The terminal part of a sentence isthe most sensitive place to be affected bynative language.