I know that cold can as well but heat does it much more easily. Why is it that heat does and not cold?
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Because the processes that result in breakage require energy to make changes in the materials. Heat provides that energy. Most chemical and physical reactions are accelerated by thermal energy. There’s even a semi-famous [equation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrhenius_equation) that describes how much.
In things like semiconductors, heat can also create a positive feedback effect. (Unlike in psychology, in engineering positive feedback usually isn’t a good thing.) Hotter transistors can “leak” more current than usual, and that can create more heat, which creates more leakage, etc. etc. This can lead to thermal runaway, which is often catastrophic.
With all that said, there are actually a small number of failure mechanisms that get worse at *colder* temperatures, and an even smaller number that are worse at intermediate temperatures. Those are usually the result of multiple different things occurring in conjunction.
*Source: I’m a former reliability engineer.*
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