Table 2.

Tests of potential moderators of the association strength between exposure variables and telomere length or telomere attrition. For reasons of statistical power, potential moderators were added one at a time.

moderator	test of moderation (Q)	p-value (Q)	parameter estimates (95% CIs)
whole dataset
longitudinal design	Q1 = 0.04	0.95	cross-sectional (ref) longitudinal −0.002 (−0.05, 0.04)
experimental study	Q1 = 2.84	0.09	correlational (ref) experimental −0.11 (−0.24, 0.02)
life stage at exposure	Q3 = 0.40	0.94	adult (ref) child 0.003 (−0.05, 0.05) embryonic 0.02 (−0.08, 0.12) not reported −0.03 (−0.16, 0.10)
life stage at telomere measurement	Q3 = 2.03	0.57	adult (ref) child 0.07 (−0.04, 0.18) embryonic −0.005 (−0.26, 0.25) not reported −0.08 (−0.34, 0.17)
tissue type	Q2 = 1.64	0.44	blood (ref) buccal cells −0.08 (−0.25, 0.10) other −0.09 (−0.26, 0.09)
technique	Q3 = 8.97	0.03*	qPCR (ref) FISH −0.21 (−0.35–0.07) Southern blot −0.03 (−0.12, 0.07) Telseq 0.09 (−0.30, 0.49)
sex	Q2 = 0.29	0.86	both sexes (ref) female −0.01 (−0.07, 0.05) male −0.01 (−0.06, 0.04)
reduced dataset
longitudinal design	Q1 = 0.00	0.98	cross-sectional (ref) longitudinal −0.0006 (−0.04, 0.04)
experimental study	Q1 = 3.24	0.07	correlational (ref) experimental −0.13 (−0.28, 0.01)
life stage at exposure	Q3 = 0.87	0.83	adult (ref) child 0.02 (−0.03, 0.06) embryonic 0.03 (−0.9, 0.15) not reported −0.01 (−0.13, 0.10)
life stage at telomere measurement	Q3 = 5.91	0.12	adult (ref) child 0.08 (−0.03, 0.19) embryonic 0.40 (0.005, 0.79) not reported 0.06 (−0.28, 0.39)
tissue type	a	a	a
technique	Q2 = 0.10	0.95	qPCR (ref) FISHb Southern blot −0.009 (−0.12, 0.10) Telseq 0.05 (−0.30, 0.39)
sex	Q2 = 0.94	0.62	both sexes (ref) female 0.03 (−0.03, 0.08) male 0.004 (−0.04, 0.05)

*p < 0.05.

^aCannot be tested because there is only a single study in any tissue type other than blood/white blood cells in the reduced dataset.

^bNo FISH studies in the reduced dataset.