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"How much did Father Christmas's sleigh cost? Zero, it was on the house."

This joke is met by moans that resonate through a storage facility in London.

This describes a joke-testing meeting with a firm that makes supplies for gatherings. Its catalogue features festive crackers.

The firm's founder smiles, almost apologetically at the gag. But the joke has made the cut and will appear in future crackers.

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

The key to a good Christmas cracker joke is not the same as a good joke per se. It is all about the setting - in this instance, the shared laughter of the Christmas dinner table with grandparents, kids and potentially neighbours.

"You want the joke to be a thing that brings the eight-year-old in harmony with the 80-year-old," she adds.

The Science Of Shared Laughter

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

"Therefore when you are laughing with people around the Christmas table you are engaging in what's almost certainly a really ancient mammalian play vocalisation," says a professor.

Communal laughter, she explains, aids in make and maintain social bonds 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 increased levels of endorphin release," the professor continues.

These natural chemicals are the body's "feel-good compounds" and are produced both to alleviate stress and pain and in response to enjoyable experiences, such as chuckling with loved ones over a particularly terrible Christmas cracker gag.

"You're not just laughing at a foolish pun with a holiday cracker," she states. "You are actually performing a lot of the truly important task of building, preserving the social bonds you have with the people you care about."

What Happens Inside the Mind?

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

A tremendous amount happens in response to humour, it transpires.

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

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

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

A gag stimulates not just the areas of the brain in charge of auditory processing and understanding language, but also brain areas associated with both planning and starting motion and those linked to vision and recall.

Put these elements as a whole, and individuals hearing a joke have a complex set of neural responses that support the laughter we hear.

The Contagious Nature of Chuckles

Scientists discovered that when a funny word is combined with chuckles there is a stronger response in the brain than the identical phrase when accompanied by a non-emotional sound.

"This activation occurred in parts of the brain that you would use to contort your expression into a grin or a laugh," the professor explains.

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

Amusement, according to the professor, can be infectious.

So what does this imply for the laughter heard around a holiday table?

"You laugh harder when you know people," she says, "and you laugh further when you are fond of them or care for them."

When it comes to Christmas cracker puns, she says, the positive factor is more probable to be triggered not by the gag itself, but from the response to it.

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

The Quest for the Perfect Cracker Joke

Is it possible to discover the perfect joke?

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

Years ago, a professor established a research search for the world's funniest gag.

More than tens of thousands of gags submitted, 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 festive cracker joke must be short, he explains.

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

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

"The reason is that if no-one finds it funny – it's the gag's shortcoming, not your own.

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

"That's a common experience at the gathering and I believe it's wonderful."