🔗 Share this article

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

This quip is met by moans that resonate through a storage facility in the capital.

We're at a humor-evaluation session with a firm that produces supplies for gatherings. Its repertoire includes Christmas crackers.

The company's founder smiles, nearly apologetically at the joke. But the joke has been selected and will appear in upcoming crackers.

"You measure the gag by the number of groans and the loudness of the groans at the table," the founder explains.

The secret to a good holiday cracker joke is not the identical as a stand-up gag in itself. It is all about the setting - in this instance, the shared laughter of the Christmas meal with grandparents, kids and possibly friends.

"You want the gag to be a thing that unites the child together with the 80-year-old," she states.

The Neuroscience Of Shared Amusement

Gathering to enjoy shared laughter is not only ancient, scientists argue, it is likely to be pre-human.

"Therefore when you are laughing with others at the holiday table you are dropping into what's very likely a truly primordial mammalian social vocalisation," says a neuroscience expert.

Communal laughter, she says, aids in make and maintain social connections between individuals.

Researchers have discovered that a lack of these social exchanges can seriously harm mental and physical well-being.

"The people you talk to, and laugh with, it results in enhanced levels of 'happy chemical' uptake," she adds.

These natural chemicals are the brain's "feel-good compounds" and are released both to reduce stress and pain and in reaction to pleasurable activities, such as chuckling with loved ones over a particularly terrible festive cracker gag.

"You're not just chuckling at a foolish pun with a holiday cracker," the expert states. "You are in fact doing a lot of the really important work of making, maintaining the connections you have with the people you love."

Which Happens Inside the Mind?

But what is truly happening inside the brain when we hear a joke?

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

Employing brain scanning technology, a type of neural imager which indicates which areas of the brain are working harder, researchers have been able to map the regions that get more blood flow.

The research involves imaging the minds of healthy participants and then exposing them to a database of funny words, accompanied by either a non-emotional sound, or recorded chuckles.

"During the study we got a very interesting activation pattern of activation," says the neuroscientist.

A gag activates not just the areas of the mind in charge of hearing and interpreting language, but also neural regions associated with both planning and initiating motion and those linked to sight and recall.

Put all of this together, and people listening to a pun have a sophisticated series of brain reactions that support the amusement we experience.

The Contagious Nature of Chuckles

Researchers discovered that when a humorous word is combined with laughter there is a greater response in the mind than the same word when followed by a neutral sound.

"This activation occurred in areas of the brain that you would employ to contort your face into a grin or a laugh," the professor explains.

It indicates we are not just responding to humorous words, they are responding to the amusement that follows them.

Laughter, according to the expert, can be contagious.

So what does this mean for the laughter found around a holiday gathering?

"You laugh more 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 jokes, she says, the positive effect is more probable to be caused not by the gag in itself, but from the reaction to it.

"The laughter is key. The gag is the dreadful Christmas cracker pun, and it's just a reason to laugh together."

The Quest for the Perfect Cracker Joke

Will we ever discover the ultimate gag?

Likely not, but that has not prevented experts from trying to.

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

Over 40,000 gags later, with ratings provided by hundreds of thousands of participants around the world, he has a clearer idea than most as to what works and what fails.

The perfect festive cracker pun needs to be short, he explains.

"But they also need to be bad jokes, jokes that make us moan," he continues.

The more "awful" the gag, he says the more effective.

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

"The fascinating part about the holiday cracker puns is that none of us considers them humorous.

"It creates a common experience around the gathering and I think it's lovely."