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

This quip is met by groans that resonate through a warehouse in the capital.

We're at a humor-evaluation session with a firm that produces supplies for gatherings. Its catalogue features festive crackers.

The firm's founder smiles, nearly apologetically at the gag. But the pun has made the cut and will feature in future crackers.

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

The key to a great Christmas cracker pun is not the same as a stand-up joke in itself. It is all about the context - in this instance, the shared laughter of the Christmas meal with grandparents, kids and possibly friends.

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

The Science Behind Shared Amusement

Coming together to experience communal amusement is not only nothing new, scientists say, it is probably to be pre-human.

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

Shared amusement, she says, aids in make and maintain social bonds between individuals.

Scientists have discovered that a lack of such social exchanges can seriously damage mental and physical health.

"The people you talk to, and share laughter with, it results in increased amounts of endorphin uptake," the professor adds.

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

"It's not simply chuckling at a foolish joke with a Christmas cracker," the expert says. "You are in fact doing a lot of the truly important task of building, preserving the social bonds you have with the people you care about."

What Happens In the Mind?

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

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

Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), a type of brain scanner which shows which parts of the brain are working harder, researchers have been able to map the regions that get more blood flow.

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

"In the scanner we got a really fascinating activation pattern of activation," notes the neuroscientist.

A gag stimulates not just the parts of the brain in charge of hearing and interpreting speech, but also neural areas involved in both preparation and initiating movement and those involved in vision and recall.

Put all of this together, and individuals listening to a joke have a sophisticated series of brain reactions that underpin the amusement we hear.

The Contagious Nature of Chuckles

Scientists discovered that when a humorous word is paired with laughter there is a greater response in the brain than the same word when accompanied by a non-emotional sound.

"This was in areas of the brain that you would use to contort your face into a grin or a laugh," the professor says.

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

Amusement, according to the professor, can be contagious.

So what does this imply for the laughter found at a Christmas gathering?

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

When it comes to Christmas cracker puns, she says, the feel-good factor is more probable to be caused not by the joke itself, but from the response to it.

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

The Quest for the Perfect Festive Pun

Is it possible to find the ultimate gag?

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

Years ago, a psychologist set up a research search for the planet's funniest joke.

Over 40,000 jokes submitted, with ratings provided by 350,000 participants around the world, he has a clearer understanding than most as to what succeeds and what does not.

The ideal Christmas cracker pun needs to be short, he explains.

"But they also need to be bad gags, puns that cause us to groan," he adds.

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

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

"The fascinating part about the holiday cracker jokes is that not one person find them humorous.

"That's a shared experience around the table and I believe it's lovely."