Step 1: Frame the question as a frequency question, not a mechanism question. Several conditions can split an aortic wall, but only one accounts for the large majority of patients seen in practice.
Step 2: The classic patient is a middle aged man, roughly 40 to 60 years old, with a long history of raised blood pressure. Chronic hypertension batters the media and is documented in well over ninety percent of dissections.
Step 3: Marfan and related connective tissue disease explain dissections in the young minority, iatrogenic injury is occasional, and Kawasaki targets coronary vessels. None of these rivals hypertension as the leading cause.
\[\boxed{\text{Hypertension is the commonest cause}}\]