What goes through your head when somebody cold-calls your c-bet? You start to think - he called my preflop raise - then my cbet. If you whiffed OOP, you have to decide how much you want to put into the turn but you are clueless about your opps hand. You can check and react to them or you can cbet again if you missed. If you are wary of a set, then how much to do you want to raise the turn if you missed? If you hit the turn (or flop) you will probably come out firing on any semi-scary board to see what your opp really has.

Therefore, calling puts all the decisions on your opponent without giving away your hand and with the minimum invested. If they check or bet weak you can take it down with any turn card usually. Or if you choose, you can see a free/cheap river card. If they come out firing when A/K hits, you can lay it down with little invested.

Rasing wars when you hold and underpair is rarely +EV. It has to be the perfect situation.