Communication science aims to establish causal effects of mediated and interpersonal communications on people and societies. However, establishing causality is challenging, especially in the context of rapidly evolving technological mediation. This working group will advocate for causal explanations in communication research. We will discuss traditional experimental methods, their limitations, and the potential of leveraging found data with quasi-experimental designs. We will also introduce Media Experiments (MEX), an infrastructure for conducting immersive social media experiments. The session aims to raise questions such as 1) What are the issues entrenched in the current methods, including misinterpretation, validity, reflexivity, and iterativity. 2) What “valid” data lend themselves to answering causal communication questions? 3) What methods should we focus on developing?