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"What was the price did Father Christmas's sled cost? Zero, it was on the house."

This quip is greeted with moans that echo through a warehouse in London.

This describes a joke-testing meeting with a company that makes products for gatherings. Its repertoire features Christmas crackers.

The company's founder grins, nearly apologetically at the joke. But the pun has made the cut and will feature in future crackers.

"The success is gauged by the joke by the volume of moans and the intensity of the groans at the table," the founder says.

The secret to a great Christmas cracker pun is not the identical as a stand-up gag per se. It is all about the context - in this case, the communal amusement of the Christmas meal with elders, kids and potentially neighbours.

"The goal is for the joke to be something that brings the child in harmony with the grandparent," she adds.

The Science Of Shared Laughter

Coming together to experience communal amusement is not only ancient, scientists argue, it is likely to be pre-human.

"Therefore when you are chuckling with others around the Christmas dinner you are dropping into what's almost certainly a truly primordial mammal social vocalisation," explains a neuroscience expert.

Communal laughter, she explains, helps forge and strengthen social connections between individuals.

Researchers have found that a absence of these social exchanges can significantly harm mental and physical well-being.

"Those you converse with, and share laughter with, it leads to enhanced amounts of 'happy chemical' uptake," she adds.

Endorphins are the brain's "happy chemicals" and are released both to reduce tension and discomfort and in response to enjoyable experiences, such as chuckling with friends over a particularly terrible Christmas cracker joke.

"It's not simply chuckling at a foolish joke with a Christmas cracker," the expert says. "You are actually performing a lot of the really important task of building, preserving the connections you have with the people you love."

Which Occurs Inside the Mind?

But what is actually happening within the mind when we listen to a joke?

A tremendous amount happens in response to humour, it turns out.

Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), a kind of brain scanner which indicates which parts of the mind are working harder, researchers have been able to map the areas that get more blood.

The research involves imaging the minds of healthy participants and then subjecting them to a database of humorous words, paired with either a neutral sound, or recorded chuckles.

"In the scanner we got a very fascinating pattern of activation," notes the neuroscientist.

A joke stimulates not just the parts of the mind responsible for hearing and interpreting speech, but also brain areas involved in both preparation and starting movement and those linked to sight and recall.

Combine all of this as a whole, and individuals listening to a pun have a complex series of neural reactions that underpin the amusement we hear.

The Infectious Nature of Laughter

Scientists discovered that when a funny word is combined with chuckles there is a greater response in the brain than the same word when accompanied by a neutral sound.

"This was in parts of the mind that you would employ to move your face into a grin or a laugh," the professor says.

It means people are not just responding to humorous words, they are reacting to the amusement that accompanies them.

Laughter, according to the expert, can be infectious.

So what does this mean for the chuckles found at a holiday table?

"You laugh more when you are familiar with people," she notes, "and you laugh further when you are fond of them or care for them."

When it comes to festive cracker jokes, she says, the feel-good factor is more probable to be caused not by the gag in itself, but from the response to it.

"It's the laughter. The joke is the terrible holiday cracker joke, and it's just a reason to laugh together."

The Quest for the Ideal Cracker Joke

Is it possible to find the perfect joke?

Likely not, but that has not stopped researchers from trying to.

In 2001, a professor established a scientific project for the planet's funniest joke.

More than tens of thousands of jokes later, with ratings lodged by hundreds of thousands of people globally, he has a clearer idea than most as to what succeeds and what does not.

The ideal festive cracker pun must be brief, he explains.

"But they also need to be poor gags, puns that make us moan," he adds.

The increasingly "terrible" the joke, he says the more effective.

"This is because if no-one laughs – it's the gag's fault, not yours.

"The fascinating part about the holiday cracker puns is that not one person considers them humorous.

"That's a common experience at the table and I believe it's lovely."