what causes a reflow

Unfortunately, lots of things. Among them some which are particularly relevant when writing CSS:

• Resizing the window
• Changing the font
• Adding or removing a stylesheet
• Content changes, such as a user typing text in
  an input box
• Activation of CSS pseudo classes such as :hover (in IE the activation of the pseudo class of a sibling)
• Manipulating the class attribute
• A script manipulating the DOM
• Calculating offsetWidth and offsetHeight
• Setting a property of the style attribute

Mozilla article about reflows that outlines causes and when they could be reduced.