Researchers from the University of Alberta in Canada found that children up to the age of three who had two or more nocturnal wakings per week were twice as likely to develop non-allergic asthma.
This type of asthma usually occurs during physical exercise, in cold weather or during a viral infection.
The authors suggest this may be because certain chemicals in the body that encourage inflammation are also involved in sleep control and sensitivity of the airways.
Previous research has linked broken sleep to ADHD and child obesity, but this is the first to associate it with asthma.
The study, published in the December issue of the European Respiratory Journal, followed 2,400 children born between 1989 and 1991 from birth to age 14.
Leanne Metcalf, director of research at Asthma UK, said, 'We generally assume that asthma symptoms themselves cause poor sleep in children, but this research has come to the somewhat surprising conclusion that the development of non-allergic asthma is actually a result of how many times a child wakes up in the night.
'It is important to note, however, that the children in this study with broken sleep also tended to come from low-income families with a stressful home environment. The link between stress and asthma is well established, although the relationship is still not fully understood.'