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"What was the price did Santa's sleigh cost? Zero, it was on the house."

This quip is greeted with moans that resonate through a warehouse in the capital.

We're at a joke-testing session with a firm that produces supplies for social events. Its repertoire includes Christmas crackers.

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

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

The secret to a great holiday cracker pun is not the identical as a good joke in itself. It is all about the context - in this instance, the communal amusement of the holiday meal with elders, children and possibly friends.

"You want the joke to be something that brings the child in harmony with the 80-year-old," she states.

The Neuroscience Of Communal Amusement

Coming together to experience communal laughter is not only ancient, scientists say, it is probably to be pre-human.

"Therefore when you are laughing with others at the holiday dinner you are engaging in what's almost certainly a really ancient mammalian social vocalisation," says a professor.

Communal laughter, she explains, aids in make and maintain social bonds between people.

Researchers have discovered that a absence of such social exchanges can seriously harm mental and physical health.

"The people you converse with, and laugh with, it results in increased levels of endorphin uptake," the professor adds.

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

"You're not just laughing at a foolish joke with a holiday cracker," she says. "You are actually doing a lot of the truly important work of building, preserving the connections you have with the people you care about."

What Occurs In the Brain?

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

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

Employing functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), a kind of neural imager which shows which areas of the mind are working harder, scientists have been able to chart the regions that receive more blood flow.

The research involves imaging the brains of healthy participants and then subjecting them to a database of funny words, paired with either a non-emotional sound, or pre-recorded laughter.

"During the study we got a very interesting activation pattern of activation," says the neuroscientist.

A joke stimulates not just the areas of the brain responsible for hearing and understanding language, but also brain areas involved in both preparation and starting movement and those involved in sight and memory.

Put all of this together, and individuals hearing a pun have a sophisticated series of neural responses that underpin the laughter we hear.

The Contagious Power of Laughter

Researchers discovered that when a funny phrase is combined with chuckles there is a greater reaction in the mind than the same word when accompanied by a non-emotional sound.

"This activation occurred in parts of the brain that you would employ to move your expression into a smile or a chuckle," the professor explains.

It indicates we are not just reacting to humorous jokes, they are reacting to the amusement that follows them.

Laughter, according to the expert, can be infectious.

So what does this mean for the laughter heard at a holiday table?

"People laugh more when you know others," she notes, "and laughter increases more when you like them or care for them."

When it comes to festive cracker jokes, she explains, the feel-good effect is more likely to be caused not by the joke in itself, but from the reaction to it.

"It's the laughter. The joke is the dreadful holiday cracker joke, and it's just a pretext to laugh as a group."

The Search for the Perfect Cracker Joke

Is it possible to find the ultimate gag?

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

In 2001, a psychologist set up a research search for the world's most humorous joke.

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

The ideal festive cracker joke needs to be brief, he says.

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

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

"The reason is that if nobody finds it funny – it's the joke's shortcoming, not your own.

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

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