Kids' sleep problems could be inherited, new research suggests

Parents cleverly pull a ruse on their daughter who pretends to be asleep by suggesting actions that can only be done while awake -- check this out! For the 30% of children who have problems falling or staying asleep -- their genes may be to blame. That's according to a 15-year study recently published in the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, which found that certain genetic variants can have an impact on children's sleep quality and quantity. Researchers from the Department of Sleep and Cognition at the Netherlands Institute for Neuroscience in Amsterdam analyzed the sleep patterns of 2,458 children, as reported by their mothers. Those who were "genetically predisposed" to insomnia -- based on polygenic risk scores that had previously been used for adults -- were more likely to have sleep problems between 1½ and 15 years of age.