🔗 Share this article

"How much did Father Christmas's sled cost? Nothing, it was on the house."

This joke is met by groans that echo through a storage facility in London.

We're at a joke-testing meeting with a company that makes supplies for gatherings. Its catalogue features Christmas crackers.

The company's founder smiles, almost apologetically at the gag. But the pun has been selected and will feature 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 good Christmas cracker pun is not the identical as a stand-up gag per se. It is entirely about the context - in this case, the shared laughter of the Christmas meal with elders, children and potentially neighbours.

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

The Science Behind Communal Laughter

Coming together to experience communal laughter is not only ancient, scientists argue, it is likely to be older than humanity.

"Therefore when you are laughing with others at the holiday table you are engaging in what's almost certainly a truly primordial mammalian play vocalisation," says a neuroscience expert.

Communal laughter, she says, aids in forge and strengthen social bonds between individuals.

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

"The people you talk to, and share laughter with, it leads to increased levels of endorphin uptake," she continues.

Endorphins are the brain's "feel-good compounds" and are produced both to alleviate tension and discomfort and in response to pleasurable activities, such as laughing with loved ones over a truly terrible Christmas cracker gag.

"You're not just chuckling at a foolish pun with a Christmas cracker," the expert says. "You are actually doing a lot of the truly important work of making, maintaining the connections you have with the people you love."

What Occurs In the Mind?

But what is actually happening within the mind when we hear a gag?

An awful lot occurs in response to humour, it turns out.

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

The research involves scanning the brains of volunteer participants and then exposing them to a database of humorous phrases, paired with either a neutral sound, or pre-recorded chuckles.

"During the study we got a very fascinating activation pattern of neural activity," says the neuroscientist.

A joke stimulates not just the areas of the brain responsible for hearing and understanding language, but also brain areas involved in both preparation and starting motion and those involved in sight and recall.

Combine all of this together, and people listening to a pun have a sophisticated set of neural responses that underpin the laughter we experience.

The Contagious Power of Laughter

Researchers found that when a humorous phrase is combined with chuckles there is a stronger reaction in the brain than the identical phrase when accompanied by a neutral sound.

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

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

Amusement, says the professor, can be contagious.

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

"People laugh harder when you know others," she says, "and you laugh more when you like them or love 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 reaction to it.

"It's the laughter. The gag is the dreadful Christmas cracker joke, and it's just a reason to chuckle together."

The Quest for the Perfect Festive Pun

Will we ever discover the ultimate joke?

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

Years ago, a professor established a research project for the planet's funniest gag.

Over tens of thousands of jokes later, with ratings provided by 350,000 participants around the world, he has a better idea than many as to what succeeds and what fails.

The perfect Christmas cracker joke needs to be brief, he says.

"They must also need to be poor jokes, jokes that cause us to groan," he continues.

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

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

"What's interesting about the holiday cracker puns is that none of us find them funny.

"That's a common experience at the table and I think it's wonderful."