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

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

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

The firm's founder smiles, almost sheepishly at the gag. But the joke has been selected and will feature in upcoming crackers.

"You measure the joke by the volume of moans and the loudness of the groans around the table," the founder explains.

The key to a great holiday cracker joke is not the same as a stand-up gag in itself. It is all about the setting - in this instance, the shared laughter of the holiday meal with elders, kids and possibly neighbours.

"The goal is for the joke to be a thing that brings the child in harmony with the grandparent," she adds.

The Neuroscience Of Shared Laughter

Gathering to enjoy shared laughter is not only nothing new, experts say, it is probably to be pre-human.

"So when you are chuckling with others around the holiday table you are dropping into what's very likely a really primordial mammalian play vocalisation," explains a neuroscience expert.

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

Scientists have discovered that a lack of these interactions can significantly damage both psychological and bodily well-being.

"Those you talk to, and share laughter with, it leads to enhanced amounts of 'happy chemical' uptake," the professor continues.

Endorphins are the body's "feel-good compounds" and are released both to alleviate tension and discomfort and in reaction to pleasurable experiences, such as laughing with loved ones over a truly awful festive cracker joke.

"It's not simply chuckling at a silly joke with a Christmas cracker," she states. "You are actually performing a lot of the really important task of building, preserving the connections you have with those you care about."

What Occurs Inside the Mind?

But what is actually happening within the brain when we listen to a gag?

An awful lot happens in reaction to comedy, it turns out.

Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), a kind of brain scanner which shows which areas of the mind are more active, researchers have been able to map the regions that get more blood flow.

Testing entails scanning the minds of healthy participants and then exposing them to a collection of funny phrases, accompanied by either a non-emotional sound, or pre-recorded chuckles.

"In the scanner we observed a very interesting pattern of activation," says the neuroscientist.

A gag stimulates not just the areas of the mind in charge of hearing and understanding speech, but also brain areas associated with both preparation and starting motion and those linked to vision and memory.

Put all of this together, and individuals hearing a joke have a complex set of brain reactions that support the amusement we hear.

The Infectious Power of Laughter

Scientists discovered that when a humorous phrase is combined with laughter there is a greater response in the mind than the same phrase when accompanied by a non-emotional sound.

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

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

Laughter, according to the professor, can be contagious.

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

"You laugh harder when you are familiar with people," she notes, "and laughter increases further when you like them or love them."

When it comes to festive cracker jokes, 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 gag is the terrible holiday cracker joke, and it's just a reason to chuckle as a group."

The Quest for the Ideal Cracker Joke

Will we ever find the perfect gag?

Probably not, but that has not stopped experts from attempting to.

In 2001, a psychologist set up a research search for the planet's funniest joke.

More than tens of thousands of gags submitted, with scores lodged by 350,000 people around the world, he has a clearer understanding than many as to what works and what fails.

The ideal festive cracker joke needs to be short, he explains.

"But they also need to be poor jokes, puns that make us groan," he continues.

The increasingly "terrible" the gag, he says the more effective.

"This is because if nobody laughs – it's the joke's fault, not your own.

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

"It creates a common moment at the gathering and I believe it's wonderful."