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"How much did Santa's sled cost? Zero, it was on the house."

This quip is met by moans that echo through a warehouse in the capital.

We're at a joke-testing meeting with a firm that produces products for gatherings. Its repertoire includes Christmas crackers.

The company's founder smiles, almost apologetically at the gag. But the joke has been selected and will feature in upcoming crackers.

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

The key to a great Christmas cracker pun is not the same as a stand-up joke per se. It is entirely about the context - in this instance, the shared laughter of the holiday dinner table with elders, kids and possibly neighbours.

"You want the gag to be something that brings the child together with the grandparent," she adds.

The Neuroscience Behind Shared Amusement

Coming together to experience shared amusement is not only nothing new, scientists say, it is likely to be older than humanity.

"Therefore when you are laughing with people around the holiday dinner you are engaging in what's very likely a really primordial mammalian play vocalisation," explains a professor.

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

Scientists have discovered that a lack of these interactions can seriously damage both psychological and bodily health.

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

These natural chemicals are the body's "happy chemicals" and are produced both to alleviate tension and discomfort and in response to pleasurable activities, such as laughing with loved ones over a particularly terrible Christmas cracker joke.

"It's not simply chuckling at a silly pun with a holiday cracker," she states. "You are actually performing a lot of the really vital work of building, preserving the social bonds you have with the people you love."

What Occurs Inside the Mind?

But what is actually taking place inside the brain when we hear a joke?

A tremendous amount occurs in reaction to comedy, it transpires.

Employing brain scanning technology, a kind of neural imager which shows which parts of the mind are more active, researchers have been able to chart the regions that get more blood flow.

Testing involves imaging the brains of healthy participants and then exposing them to a database of funny phrases, accompanied by either a non-emotional sound, or recorded chuckles.

"During the study we observed a very interesting pattern of neural activity," notes the neuroscientist.

A gag activates not just the areas of the mind in charge of hearing and interpreting speech, but also brain regions involved in both preparation and initiating movement and those linked to vision and memory.

Put all of this together, and individuals listening to a pun have a complex set of brain reactions that support the amusement we experience.

The Infectious Nature of Chuckles

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

"This was in parts of the brain that you would use to contort your face into a smile or a laugh," she explains.

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

Laughter, says the professor, can be contagious.

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

"You laugh more when you know people," she notes, "and you laugh further when you like them or care for them."

When it comes to festive cracker jokes, she explains, the positive effect is more probable to be triggered not by the gag itself, but from the reaction to it.

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

The Search for the Ideal Cracker Joke

Is it possible to find the perfect gag?

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

Years ago, a psychologist set up a research search for the world's most humorous joke.

Over tens of thousands of gags later, with ratings lodged by hundreds of thousands of people around the world, he has a better idea than many as to what succeeds and what does not.

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

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

The more "awful" the gag, he states the better.

"The reason is that if nobody finds it funny – it's the joke's fault, not yours.

"What's interesting about the holiday cracker jokes is that none of us considers them humorous.

"That's a common experience around the gathering and I think it's wonderful."