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Research has found children are seven times more likely to sleepwalk if both their parents have a history of taking nocturnal strolls (stock image)

If you or your partner are sleepwalkers, chances are your children will be as well.

Research has found children are seven times more likely to sleepwalk if both their parents have a history of taking nocturnal strolls.

More than 60 per cent of children developed sleepwalking when both their parents were sleepwalkers in a study of youngsters in the Canadian province of Quebec.

Sleepwalking is a common childhood sleep disorder that usually disappears during adolescence, although it can persist or even appear in adulthood.

Sleep terrors are another early childhood sleep disorder often characterised by a scream, intense fear and a prolonged period of inconsolability.

Researchers from the Hopital du Sacre-Coeur de Montreal said the two disorders - known as parasomnias - share many of the same characteristics and arise mainly from deep sleep.

Doctor Jacques Montplaisir from the hospital looked at the prevalence of sleepwalking and sleep terrors during childhood. 

He wanted to identify any link between early sleep terrors and sleepwalking later in childhood, and the degree of association between parental history of sleepwalking and the presence of sleepwalking and sleep terrors in children.

His team analysed sleep data from a group of 1,940 children born in the province in 1997 and 1998 and studied in 1999 to 2011.

Sleep terrors and sleepwalking were assessed through questionnaires and parental sleepwalking was also asked about.

The study found an overall childhood prevalence of sleep terrors among one-and-a-half to 13-year-olds - of 56 per cent. 

There was a high prevalence of sleep terrors (34 per cent) at 18 months of age, but decreased to 5 per cent by the age of 13.

Researchers analysed sleep data from a group of 1,940 children. Sleep terrors (stock image) and sleepwalking were assessed through questionnaires. Children with one parent who was a sleepwalker had three times the odds of becoming a sleepwalker, compared with children whose parents did not sleepwalk

The overall childhood prevalence of sleepwalking among two-and-a-half to 13-year-olds was 29 per cent.

Sleepwalking was relatively infrequent during pre-school years, but the prevalence increased steadily to 13 per cent by the age of 10.

The study results show that children who had sleep terrors during early childhood - up to the age of three-and-a-half - were a third more likely to develop sleepwalking aged five or older than children who didn't experience sleep terrors in early childhood.

And the children's odds of sleepwalking increased based on the sleepwalking history of their parents. 

Children with one parent who was a sleepwalker had three times the odds of becoming a sleepwalker, compared with children whose parents did not sleepwalk.

And the results showed children whose parents both had a history of sleepwalking had seven times the odds of becoming a sleepwalker. 

Dr Montplaisir said: '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 findings are published online by JAMA Pediatrics.