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

This quip is greeted with groans that echo through a warehouse in the capital.

This describes a humor-evaluation meeting with a firm that makes supplies for gatherings. Its repertoire includes festive crackers.

The firm's owner smiles, nearly sheepishly at the gag. But the joke has made the cut and will appear in upcoming crackers.

"You measure the joke by the number of groans and the intensity of the groans around the table," she explains.

The key to a great holiday cracker joke is not the same as a good gag in itself. It is entirely about the context - in this case, the communal laughter of the Christmas dinner table with elders, kids and potentially friends.

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

The Neuroscience Behind Communal Laughter

Gathering to experience communal amusement is not only ancient, experts say, it is likely to be older than humanity.

"So when you are chuckling with people at the Christmas table you are engaging in what's very likely a really primordial mammalian play sound," says a professor.

Shared amusement, she says, aids in make and maintain social connections between people.

Scientists have found that a lack of these interactions can seriously damage mental and physical well-being.

"Those you converse with, and laugh with, it leads to enhanced levels of 'happy chemical' release," the professor adds.

These natural chemicals are the brain's "happy chemicals" and are produced both to alleviate stress and pain and in response to enjoyable activities, such as chuckling with loved ones over a particularly terrible festive cracker gag.

"It's not simply laughing at a foolish joke with a holiday cracker," the expert states. "You are in fact doing a lot of the really vital task of building, preserving the social bonds you have with the people you care about."

Which Happens Inside the Mind?

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

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

Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), a kind of neural imager which shows which parts of the mind are working harder, scientists have been able to map the areas that get more blood flow.

Testing involves scanning the brains of volunteer subjects and then subjecting them to a database of funny phrases, accompanied by either a non-emotional sound, or recorded chuckles.

"During the study we observed a really interesting activation pattern of neural activity," notes the professor.

A gag activates not just the parts of the brain responsible for auditory processing and interpreting language, but also neural areas associated with both preparation and initiating motion and those linked to vision and recall.

Combine these elements as a whole, and individuals hearing a joke have a sophisticated series of brain responses that support the amusement we hear.

The Infectious Power of Laughter

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

"This activation occurred in areas of the brain that you would employ to move 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 follows them.

Laughter, according to the expert, can be infectious.

So what does this mean for the chuckles heard at a Christmas gathering?

"People laugh more when you are familiar with others," she notes, "and laughter increases further when you like them or care for them."

When it comes to Christmas cracker jokes, she says, the feel-good effect is more probable to be caused not by the gag in 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 together."

The Quest for the Ideal Festive Pun

Will we ever find the perfect joke?

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

Years ago, a professor set up a scientific project for the world's most humorous gag.

Over 40,000 jokes submitted, with ratings lodged by 350,000 participants globally, he has a clearer idea than most as to what succeeds and what does not.

The ideal festive cracker pun must be short, he explains.

"But they also be bad gags, jokes that cause us to moan," he continues.

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

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

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

"That's a shared experience around the gathering and I think it's wonderful."