Correlation and causation worksheets

Towns with more police officers report more crime. Ice cream sales and sunburns rise together. Two things moving together is a correlation, and these free printable worksheets ask the next question: why?

Correlation and causation
Correlation and causation worksheet — Sixteen scenarios, three verdicts, free printable with answer key

The answer key prints on a separate page.

What's on this sheet

"Correlation or causation?" is the usual wording and it is a yes-or-no question wearing two long words. The version worth asking has three answers, because a correlation that is not a direct cause is not therefore meaningless — it is usually one of two other things. The first causes the second (more rain, a fuller reservoir). The second causes the first (more crime, so a town hires more police). Or something else causes both (hot days sell ice cream and burn skin).

Why this sheet works

The middle one is why the sheet exists. A student who has learnt only "correlation is not causation" still reads the police sentence as the officers causing the crime; naming reversed causation out loud is what stops that, and it is the hardest of the three because every one of those sentences is written in the order that invites the wrong answer.

How this one works

Try the cause both ways round

they move together
neither direction works
Something else causes both
  1. Two things go up and down together: Ice cream sales and sunburns rise and fall together. Moving together is a CORRELATION — on its own it says nothing about what causes what.
  2. Could either one cause the other? Neither reading makes sense on its own.
  3. Hot sunny days cause both. Ice cream does not burn skin.