The detection and attribution of tropospheric water vapour changes can be traced back to Santer et al. (2007), who used estimates of atmospheric water vapour from the satellite-based Special Sensor Microwave Imager (SSM/I) and from CMIP3 historical climate simulations. They provided evidence of human-induced moistening of the troposphere, and found that the simulated human fingerprint pattern was detectable at the 5% level by 2002 in water vapour satellite data (from 1988 to 2006). The observed changes matched the historical simulations forced by greenhouse gas changes and other anthropogenic forcings, and not those due to natural variability alone. Then, Santer et al. (2009) repeated this study with CMIP5 models, and found that the detection and attribution conclusions were not sensitive to model quality. These results demonstrate that the human fingerprint is governed by robust and basic physical processes, such as the water vapour feedback. Finally, Chung et al. (2014) extended this line of research by focusing on the global-mean water vapour content in the upper troposphere. Using satellite-based observations and sets of CMIP5 climate simulations run under various climateforcing options, they showed that the observed moistening trend of the upper troposphere over the 1979–2005 period could not be explained by internal variability alone, but is attributable to a combination of anthropogenic and natural forcings. This increase in water vapour is accompanied by a reduction in mid-tropospheric relative humidity and clouds in the subtropics and mid-latitude in both models and observations related to changes in the Hadley cell (Section 3.3.3.1.1; Lau and Kim, 2015).
AR6, The Physical Science Basis, Ch 3: Human Influence on the Climate System, pg 451