New research found the tendency to sleepwalk could be inherited from one's parents, and night terrors in childhood can also influence sleepwalking risk.
Sleepwalking is commonly seen in children, and usually disappear in adolescence; sleep terrors are also often experienced in childhood, the JAMA Network Journals reported. These two disorders share common characteristics, and are believed to come from low-wave sleep. This new research found over 60 percent of children who had two sleepwalking parents also developed the disorder.
A team of researchers looked at sleep data from a group of 1,940 children born in the Canadian province of Quebec between 1997 and 1998, and who were studied between 1999 and 2011. The prevalence of sleepwalking and sleep terrors were determined through questionnaires that included parental sleepwalking questions.
The researchers found sleep terrors was present in 56.2 percent of participants between the ages of one-and-half and 13. Sleep terror rates were at 34.4 percent at one-and-a-half years of age, but dropped to 5.3 percent by the age of 13. Children who had sleep terrors between the ages of one-and-a-half and three-and-a-half were more likely to start sleepwalking by the age of 5 than those who did not.
Additionally, children's chances of becoming sleepwalkers were based on their parents' history of the disorder. Kids who had one sleepwalking parent had a three times higher risk of sleepwalking themselves, and those with two sleepwalking parents had seven-fold elevated risk.
"These findings point to a strong genetic influence on sleepwalking and, to a lesser degree, sleep terrors. This effect may occur through polymorphisms in the genes involved in slow-wave sleep generation or sleep depth. Parents who have been sleepwalkers in the past, particularly in cases where both parents have been sleepwalkers, can expect their children to sleepwalk and thus should prepare adequately," the study concluded.
The findings were published in a recent edition of the journal JAMA Pediatrics.
