suppose you have an electric field described by a potential \phi, the force is F = - q * d\phi/dx where q is the electric charge now suppose you're in a grav

suppose you have an electric field described by a potential \phi, the force is F = - q * d\phi/dx where q is the electric charge now suppose you're in a gravitational potential \phi_g, the force is F_g = - m * d\phi_g/dz where m is the mass. as you can see it's like the newton equation, so yes looks like an acceleration :)