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"What was the price did Santa's sleigh cost? Nothing, it was on the house."

This one-liner is greeted with moans that echo through a warehouse in the capital.

This describes a joke-testing session with a company that makes supplies for gatherings. Its repertoire includes festive crackers.

The company's founder grins, nearly sheepishly at the joke. But the pun has been selected and will appear in future crackers.

"The success is gauged by the joke by the volume of groans and the loudness of the groans around the table," the founder explains.

The secret to a great Christmas cracker pun is not the same as a stand-up gag in itself. It is entirely about the context - in this instance, the shared amusement of the holiday meal with elders, children and potentially friends.

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

The Science Of Shared Laughter

Coming together to enjoy shared amusement is not only nothing new, experts argue, it is likely to be pre-human.

"Therefore when you are laughing with people around the holiday table you are engaging in what's very likely a truly primordial mammalian play sound," says a neuroscience expert.

Shared amusement, she explains, helps forge and strengthen social connections between people.

Scientists have found that a absence of these social exchanges can significantly damage both psychological and bodily health.

"Those you talk to, and share laughter with, it results in enhanced amounts of 'happy chemical' release," the professor adds.

These natural chemicals are the body's "feel-good compounds" and are released both to reduce stress and pain and in reaction to enjoyable experiences, such as laughing with loved ones over a particularly awful Christmas cracker gag.

"You're not just chuckling at a silly joke with a Christmas cracker," the expert states. "You are actually performing a lot of the really important work of making, maintaining the connections you have with the people you care about."

What Happens In the Mind?

But what is truly happening inside the mind when we hear a gag?

A tremendous amount occurs in reaction to humour, it turns out.

Employing brain scanning technology, a type of neural imager which indicates which parts of the mind are working harder, scientists have been able to map the regions that receive more blood.

Testing entails scanning the minds of healthy subjects and then subjecting them to a database of humorous words, accompanied by either a neutral sound, or recorded chuckles.

"In the scanner we observed a really 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 neural regions involved in both planning and starting motion and those involved in sight and memory.

Put these elements as a whole, and individuals listening to a joke have a sophisticated series of neural responses that support the laughter we experience.

The Contagious Power of Chuckles

Scientists discovered that when a humorous word is paired with chuckles there is a greater response in the mind than the same phrase when accompanied by a neutral sound.

"This was in parts of the mind that you would employ to contort your face into a smile or a chuckle," she says.

It indicates people are not just reacting to humorous words, they are responding to the laughter that follows them.

Amusement, according to the expert, can be contagious.

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

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

When it comes to festive cracker jokes, she explains, the positive factor is more likely to be caused not by the joke in itself, but from the response to it.

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

The Quest for the Perfect Festive Pun

Is it possible to find the ultimate gag?

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

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

More than 40,000 gags later, with ratings lodged by hundreds of thousands of participants around the world, he has a better idea than many as to what succeeds and what fails.

The ideal Christmas cracker pun must be short, he says.

"But they also be bad jokes, jokes that cause us to groan," he continues.

The increasingly "terrible" the joke, he states the better.

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

"The fascinating part about the Christmas cracker jokes is that none of us find them humorous.

"It creates a shared experience around the table and I believe it's wonderful."