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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 the capital.

We're at a humor-evaluation session with a company that makes products for gatherings. Its catalogue includes festive crackers.

The firm's owner smiles, almost sheepishly at the joke. But the joke has been selected 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," she says.

The secret to a good holiday cracker pun is not the identical as a stand-up gag in itself. It is all about the setting - in this case, the shared laughter of the holiday meal with elders, children and possibly neighbours.

"You want the gag to be a thing that unites the eight-year-old in harmony with the 80-year-old," she states.

The Neuroscience Of Communal Laughter

Gathering to experience shared amusement is not only ancient, experts argue, it is likely to be older than humanity.

"So when you are chuckling with others at the holiday table you are dropping into what's almost certainly a really primordial mammal social vocalisation," says a neuroscience expert.

Communal amusement, she says, aids in forge and strengthen social bonds between people.

Researchers have discovered that a lack of such interactions can seriously damage mental and physical health.

"The people you converse with, and share laughter with, it leads to increased levels of endorphin release," the professor adds.

These natural chemicals are the body's "feel-good compounds" and are produced both to reduce tension and discomfort and in response to enjoyable experiences, such as laughing with loved ones over a truly terrible Christmas cracker joke.

"It's not simply laughing at a silly pun with a Christmas cracker," the expert says. "You are in fact doing a lot of the truly important work of building, preserving the connections you have with the people you care about."

What Happens In the Brain?

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

An awful lot occurs in reaction to comedy, it turns out.

Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), a type of neural imager which indicates which parts of the brain are working harder, scientists have been able to map the areas that receive more blood.

The research entails scanning the brains of volunteer participants and then subjecting them to a database of humorous phrases, paired with either a neutral sound, or recorded laughter.

"During the study we got a really fascinating activation pattern of neural activity," notes the professor.

A joke stimulates not just the parts of the mind responsible for auditory processing and understanding language, but also brain areas involved in both preparation and starting motion and those linked to sight and memory.

Combine these elements together, and individuals listening to a pun have a complex series of neural reactions that support the laughter we experience.

The Infectious Nature of Chuckles

Researchers discovered that when a humorous phrase is combined with chuckles there is a stronger response in the mind than the same word when followed by a neutral sound.

"This activation occurred in areas of the brain that you would employ to move your face into a smile or a laugh," the professor explains.

It means people are not just responding to humorous jokes, they are responding to the laughter that follows them.

Amusement, says the professor, can be infectious.

So what does this mean for the laughter found around a holiday gathering?

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

When it comes to Christmas cracker puns, she says, the positive effect is more likely to be caused not by the gag itself, but from the reaction to it.

"It's the laughter. The joke is the terrible Christmas cracker joke, and it's just a pretext to chuckle together."

The Search for the Perfect Festive Pun

Will we ever find the ultimate gag?

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

In 2001, a professor established a scientific project for the world's most humorous gag.

More than 40,000 jokes submitted, with scores lodged by hundreds of thousands of people around the world, he has a clearer idea than most as to what works and what fails.

The perfect Christmas cracker joke needs to be brief, he explains.

"They must also be poor gags, puns that cause us to moan," he continues.

The more "terrible" the joke, he says the better.

"This is because if nobody finds it funny – it's the gag's shortcoming, not yours.

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

"It creates a shared experience at the table and I think it's lovely."