If you say to-may-to and I say to-may-to, we have a much better chance of understanding each other.

A carefully controlled study has found that imitating the accent of the person you’re speaking to increases comprehension noticeably, even with a strange accent.

“The whole premise is that people very quickly adapt,” Dr. Patti Adank, of the University Manchester School of Psychological Sciences, told the Star on Tuesday.

“Just listening to themselves speak in the accent increased comprehension.”

The study, published in the journal Psychological Sciences, found that imitation was the biggest factor affecting understanding of a strange accent. People trained to hear the accent did no better picking up unusual sounds than people untrained — unless they also imitated the accent.

“Critics have said people are just paying extra special attention to a strange accent,” said Adank, “but this [research] finds that is not the case.”

Adank, who is Dutch, and her colleagues Peter Hagoort and Harold Bekkering created their own accent so none of the 120 test subjects would be familiar with it.

In a multicultural society, the findings provide a means to increase understanding, said Adank.

Pronouncing “slip” and “sleep” differently is difficult for Japanese speakers and makes listening difficult for English speakers, for example. Imitating leaps that gap.

Adank and her colleagues are extending their research to see how much personality plays a role.

“Is there a link between imitation and a person’s level of empathy? There should be if empathy means people who are more willing to place themselves in another’s position,” said Adank.

“This speaks to the ability to infer other people’s intentions and emotional intelligence.”

On a social level, it could help figure out how different individuals will adjust to hearing aids. On a medical level, it could help explain why people with Asperger’s syndrome have difficulty with imitation and with too many different noises at once.

Everyone has an accent, Adank said, noting that “there are so many different variations of English.”

She confesses to imitating accents herself “but not to their face. I imitate accents I hear on TV.

“I think it would be great to have a Glaswegian accent.”