What Do Christmas Cracker Gags Do to Our Brains?

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

This joke is greeted with groans that resonate through a warehouse in London.

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

The company's founder grins, almost apologetically at the joke. But the joke has made the cut and will feature in upcoming crackers.

"You measure the joke by the volume of groans and the intensity of the groans around the table," she says.

The key to a good holiday cracker pun is not the identical as a stand-up joke in itself. It is entirely about the context - in this instance, the shared amusement of the holiday dinner table with elders, kids and potentially neighbours.

"You want the joke to be something that brings the eight-year-old together with the 80-year-old," she states.

The Science Of Communal Laughter

Gathering to experience communal amusement is not only nothing new, scientists say, it is likely to be older than humanity.

"Therefore when you are laughing with people at the holiday dinner you are dropping into what's very likely a really primordial mammalian play vocalisation," says a neuroscience expert.

Communal amusement, she explains, aids in forge and strengthen social bonds between people.

Researchers have discovered that a absence of such interactions can significantly harm mental and physical well-being.

"The people you talk to, and laugh with, it leads to enhanced levels of endorphin uptake," she continues.

These natural chemicals are the brain's "feel-good compounds" and are released both to alleviate tension and discomfort and in response to pleasurable activities, such as chuckling with friends over a truly terrible festive cracker joke.

"You're not just laughing at a foolish pun with a holiday cracker," she says. "You are actually doing a lot of the truly vital task of making, maintaining the social bonds you have with the people you love."

What Occurs Inside the Mind?

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

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

Employing functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), a type of neural imager which shows which areas of the mind are working harder, researchers have been able to chart the areas that receive more blood flow.

Testing involves scanning the minds of volunteer participants and then subjecting them to a collection of humorous words, accompanied by either a neutral sound, or recorded chuckles.

"In the scanner we got a really interesting activation pattern of neural activity," says the neuroscientist.

A gag activates not just the areas of the mind in charge of hearing and understanding language, but also brain areas associated with both planning and starting motion and those involved in vision and memory.

Combine these elements as a whole, and people listening to a joke have a complex series of neural responses that support the laughter we experience.

The Contagious Nature of Laughter

Researchers discovered that when a humorous phrase is paired with laughter there is a stronger response in the brain than the same phrase when followed by a neutral sound.

"This was in areas of the brain that you would use to contort your face into a smile or a chuckle," the professor explains.

It indicates we are not just responding to funny words, they are reacting to the laughter that accompanies them.

Laughter, says the professor, can be infectious.

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

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

When it comes to Christmas cracker jokes, she explains, the feel-good factor is more likely to be caused not by the joke in itself, but from the response to it.

"The laughter is key. The gag is the terrible holiday cracker joke, and it's just a reason to chuckle as a group."

The Search for the Perfect Festive Pun

Will we ever find the perfect gag?

Probably not, but that has not prevented researchers from trying to.

Years ago, a professor established a scientific project for the world's funniest gag.

Over tens of thousands of gags submitted, with ratings lodged by 350,000 participants around the world, he has a clearer understanding than most as to what works and what does not.

The perfect Christmas cracker joke must be short, he explains.

"They must also be poor jokes, jokes that make us groan," he continues.

The increasingly "terrible" the gag, he states the better.

"This is because if no-one laughs – it's the joke's shortcoming, not your own.

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

"It creates a common moment at the table and I believe it's lovely."