Basic Trope: A character's behavior as a child foreshadows their personality as an adult.
- Straight: Madison loved to run around outside as a child; now she's an energetic track star.
- Exaggerated:
- As a fetus, Madison was constantly moving around in her mother's womb.
- Madison was already competing in pro sports events as an infant.
- Literally all of Madison's personality traits were present when she was a child.
- Downplayed: Madison started running when she was twelve, and she's still interested in sports as a young adult.
- Justified: Madison's mother Laurie is also a pro-athlete who wanted Madison to follow in her footsteps.
- Inverted:
- In the main series, Madison is an energetic baby, but a Flash Forward episode shows her becoming a track star as an adult.
- Despite being a sporty adult, Madison was actually quite lazy as a child.
- Subverted:
- That sporty child we were watching wasn't actually Madison; she's over there playing with dolls.
- Madison only pretended to like sports when her mom was watching; she didn't really get into them until adulthood.
- Double Subverted: It turns out Madison did eventually get into sports later in her childhood.
- Parodied: ???
- Zig-Zagged: While Madison was interested in sports like her adult self, she was also very pessimistic, while her adult self is The Pollyanna.
- Averted: Madison was interested in different things as a child.
- Enforced: The writers wanted to make sure the audience would recognize child Madison as the same character as adult Madison.
- Lampshaded: "Wow, I guess you didn't change much in twenty years."
- Invoked: Madison's parents get her into sports early knowing she'll be more talented as an adult if she starts practicing now.
- Exploited: A time-traveler looking to find Madison in the past sets up a race for kids her age, knowing she'll surely join if she's anything like her adult self.
- Defied: ???
- Discussed: "These track stars are so obsessed with running, they probably raced each other as soon as they could walk!"
- Conversed: "That must be the same character, she acts just like her adult self."
- Implied: Madison is a young adult who mentions she's been into sports for twenty years.
- Deconstructed: Madison worries that acting the same way she did as a child means she hasn't actually grown and matured enough as an adult.
- Reconstructed: ...But she realizes that, even if she has some traits from her childhood, she embraces them in a more nuanced, mature way.
- Played for Laughs: Twenty-year-old Madison has a habit of not looking where she's going and stepping in dog poo. Turns out, the first time she ever learned to walk as a toddler, she stepped in dog poo.
- Played for Drama: Madison is incredibly meek and doesn't talk much as a child, which turns out to be a communication disorder that makes things difficult for her as an adult.
- Played for Horror: Madison killed cats in her childhood, and is now a full-blown serial killer fascinated with murder.
Back to Early Personality Signs.
