system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
What is the point of correlation studies if correlation does not equal causation?

It seems that every time there is a study posted on reddit with something to the effect of “new study has found that children who are read to by their parents once daily show fewer signs of ADHD.” And then the top comment is always something to the effect of “well its probably more likely that parents are more willing to sit down and read to kids who have longer attention spans to do so in the first place.”

And then there are those websites that show funny correlations like how a rise in TV sales in a city also came with a rise in deaths, so we should just ban TVs to save lives.

So why are these studies important/relevant?
gpt
Correlation does not equal causation, but there still may be a causal link, even if it is not a direct one. Understanding this link may give us insight in related concepts, and often the first step in understanding this link is to identify a pattern. 

So you're right, TV sales correlating with deaths alone is mostly meaningless. However, if we understand the underlying connection, for example that a growing population means more TV sales and more deaths, then suddenly we can look at other cities where we don't have population statistics but know how many TVs get sold and how many people are dying and estimate population trends. Or if the sales of TVs suddenly flatten out but the deaths don't, we know that some new factor has disturbed the correlation that may need investigating... maybe average wealth is decreasing, maybe employment is going up, and maybe new TVs have death rays in them, or it may be completely unrelated and, for example, advances in TV technology has slowed and so people aren't replacing theirs as often.

But before you can understand the pattern you have to identify it.