What causes stories to stick?

BJ Fogg blogs in the Captology Notebook about the importance of causality:

I believe we humans are hardwired to absorb narratives, because through narrative we learn about causal relationships; we learn how things work in the world.

Daniel Willingham would agree, he argues that stories are "psychologically privileged" because of their structure and reliance on causality. Stories, Willingham writes, are more interesting, and are easier to comprehend and remember.

Stories are easier to understand because we know to expect a causal relationship between present and past narrative events. Causal connections make stories easier to remember by providing an effective web of associations. If however, those connections are made too explicit listeners lose interest; readers are engaged by stories that require them to make reasonable inferences.

Interestingly, our expectation is so strong that we will make causal connections in an attempt to remember a story, even if they are not present.