The Impact of Holiday Cracker Puns Influence The Brain?

"How much did Santa's sled cost? Zero, 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 meeting with a company that produces products for gatherings. Its repertoire features Christmas crackers.

The company's owner smiles, almost apologetically at the joke. But the joke has been selected and will feature in upcoming crackers.

"The success is gauged by the gag by the volume of groans and the intensity of the groans at the table," the founder explains.

The key to a great Christmas cracker joke is not the same as a stand-up joke per se. It is entirely about the setting - in this case, the communal laughter of the holiday dinner table with grandparents, kids and potentially neighbours.

"The goal is for the gag to be something that unites the child in harmony with the grandparent," she states.

The Science Of Communal Amusement

Coming together to experience communal laughter is not only ancient, experts say, it is probably to be pre-human.

"Therefore when you are chuckling with others around the Christmas table you are engaging in what's very likely a really ancient mammalian social sound," explains a neuroscience expert.

Communal laughter, she explains, helps forge and strengthen social bonds between people.

Researchers have discovered that a lack of these social exchanges can significantly damage mental and physical health.

"Those you converse with, and share laughter with, it results in enhanced levels of 'happy chemical' uptake," the professor adds.

These natural chemicals are the body's "feel-good compounds" and are released both to reduce stress and pain and in response to enjoyable experiences, such as laughing with friends over a truly terrible Christmas cracker joke.

"It's not simply chuckling at a foolish joke with a holiday cracker," the expert states. "You are actually doing a lot of the truly important task of making, maintaining the connections you have with the people you care about."

Which Happens Inside the Mind?

But what is truly happening inside the mind when we listen to a joke?

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

Employing functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), a kind of brain scanner which shows which parts of the brain are more active, researchers have been able to chart the areas that get more blood.

Testing involves scanning the minds of volunteer subjects and then exposing them to a collection of funny phrases, paired with either a neutral sound, or pre-recorded laughter.

"In the scanner we got a very interesting pattern of activation," says the professor.

A gag activates not just the areas of the mind responsible for auditory processing and interpreting language, but also neural regions associated with both preparation and initiating motion and those involved in vision and recall.

Combine these elements together, and people hearing a joke have a sophisticated set of brain responses that support the amusement we hear.

The Infectious Power of Chuckles

Researchers found that when a humorous word is combined with laughter there is a greater reaction in the mind than the same phrase when accompanied by a neutral sound.

"This activation occurred in areas of the mind that you would employ to move your face into a smile or a chuckle," the professor explains.

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

Laughter, says the professor, can be contagious.

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

"You laugh more when you are familiar with people," she notes, "and laughter increases more when you are fond of them or care for them."

When it comes to festive cracker puns, she says, the feel-good effect is more likely to be caused not by the joke itself, but from the reaction to it.

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

The Quest for the Ideal Cracker Joke

Is it possible to find the perfect gag?

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

In 2001, a professor established a scientific search for the world's most humorous gag.

Over tens of thousands of gags later, with ratings lodged by hundreds of thousands of participants around the world, he has a clearer understanding than most as to what succeeds and what fails.

The ideal festive cracker joke needs to be brief, he says.

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

The increasingly "awful" the gag, he states the more effective.

"The reason is that if nobody finds it funny – it's the joke's shortcoming, not yours.

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

"It creates a shared moment around the table and I think it's wonderful."