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"How much did Father Christmas's sled cost? Nothing, it was on the house."

This one-liner is met by moans that echo through a warehouse in the capital.

This describes a humor-evaluation session with a firm that makes supplies for gatherings. Its catalogue features Christmas crackers.

The company's owner grins, nearly sheepishly at the gag. But the joke has been selected and will feature in upcoming crackers.

"You measure the gag by the volume of moans and the loudness of the groans at the table," she says.

The key to a good Christmas cracker joke is not the identical as a good joke per se. It is entirely about the context - in this instance, the communal amusement of the holiday meal with elders, children and potentially friends.

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

The Science Behind Shared Amusement

Coming together to enjoy shared amusement is not only ancient, experts say, it is likely to be pre-human.

"So when you are laughing with people at the Christmas table you are dropping into what's very likely a truly primordial mammal play sound," says a neuroscience expert.

Communal laughter, she explains, helps make and maintain social connections between people.

Researchers have found that a absence of these social exchanges can significantly harm both psychological and bodily well-being.

"Those you converse with, and laugh with, it leads to enhanced levels of endorphin release," the professor continues.

Endorphins are the brain's "happy chemicals" and are released both to reduce tension and discomfort and in reaction to pleasurable experiences, such as chuckling with friends over a particularly awful festive cracker joke.

"You're not just laughing at a silly joke with a Christmas cracker," she states. "You are in fact doing a lot of the truly important task of building, preserving the connections you have with the people you care about."

What Occurs In the Mind?

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

An awful lot happens in reaction to comedy, it transpires.

Using brain scanning technology, a type of neural imager which shows which areas of the mind are more active, scientists have been able to chart the regions that get more blood.

The research entails scanning the brains of healthy participants and then exposing them to a collection of funny phrases, paired with either a non-emotional sound, or pre-recorded chuckles.

"During the study we got a really fascinating activation pattern of activation," says the neuroscientist.

A gag activates not just the parts of the mind in charge of auditory processing and understanding language, but also neural areas associated with both planning and starting movement and those involved in sight and memory.

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

The Contagious Nature of Chuckles

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

"This was in areas of the brain that you would employ to contort your expression into a smile or a chuckle," she explains.

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

Laughter, says the expert, can be infectious.

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

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

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

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

The Quest for the Ideal Cracker Joke

Is it possible to find the ultimate joke?

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

In 2001, a psychologist established a scientific project for the planet's most humorous gag.

Over tens of thousands of jokes later, with scores provided by 350,000 people globally, he has a better idea than many as to what succeeds and what fails.

The perfect Christmas cracker pun needs to be brief, he says.

"But they also be bad gags, puns that make us moan," he continues.

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

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

"What's interesting about the holiday cracker puns is that not one person find them humorous.

"It creates a shared moment around the gathering and I think it's lovely."