Basic Trope: An unwanted baby is placed on a doorstep for the occupants of the house to raise.
- Straight: Bob's mother leaves him at the doorsteps of his aunt and uncle's home.
- Exaggerated:
- Babies are piled on the doorstep, resulting in a Wave of Babies when the door is opened.
- Every doorstep in the neighborhood has an abandoned baby on it, and no one thinks that anything is out of the ordinary.
- Downplayed: The new parents of Bob know they'll be adopting a baby and greet his mother or a social worker at the door with Bob.
- Justified:
- Bob's parents can't afford a baby, and there is no orphanage in town.
- Same as above, except the parents simply don't want a baby.
- Bob's parents are on death's door; It's only a matter of time before they pass, and they don't want little Bob to live life without parents.
- Inverted:
- Bob is an adult and can no longer take care of his aging mother, so he leaves her on someone's doorstep.
- A mother leaves the baby on her own doorstep, in hopes that someone else will take it.
- Someone goes door to door asking for unwanted children.
- Becky needs help getting pregnant, so she sits herself down on the nearest doorstep and waits.
- Subverted:
- Bob's mother leaves him at the doorsteps of his aunt and uncle's home...before they arrive back home, Bob is stolen by a thief.
- The doorstep is a church or orphanage and it is understood in that town that babies left there have been surrendered for adoption.
- Double Subverted:
- The thief changes his mind and leaves Bob on another doorstep.
- But then another baby is left at the door of a house.
- Parodied:
- The kindly parents take the infant in. The next day, a dozen more babies of different species are waiting for them on the doorstep.
- Bob's parents celebrate "National Baby-Swapping Day": they leave Bob on another couple's doorstep, and the other couple gives their baby to Bob's parents in the same way.
- Zig Zagged: The baby is sick, but is healed, but gets sick again when it isn't on the doorstep, and gets thrown out for being too much of a hassle, whereupon it gets sick again.
- Averted: No babies are left on doorsteps.
- Enforced: "If they just find the baby in the open, they may assume it's just lost. If the baby's on the doorstep, people will understand it was left for them to find."
- Lampshaded: "What the? I don't remember placing a baby on my doorstep. Someone must have left it here."
- Invoked:
- A desperate, infertile couple puts a sign up on their door requesting foundlings.
- The father kidnaps the baby and places him on the doorstep.
- Exploited: Someone who wants to adopt a child attempts to encourage people to abandon babies on their doorstep, not someone else's.
- Defied:
- The mother abandons the child where she knows it will not be discovered.
- The baby is put up for adoption the normal way.
- The mother knocks on the door, and hands the baby directly to the couple.
- Discussed: "Anything on the doorstep this morning? Milk? Newspaper? Baby?"
- Conversed: "Why do so many babies get abandoned on this show?" "I guess it's better than killing them."
- Deconstructed: The baby is very sick and malnourished.
- Reconstructed: The baby is reared back to health.
- Played For Laughs: The first house has a sign on the door which reads "no babies please". The mother has to stop by twelve more houses before finding one without such a sign.
- Played For Drama:
- The baby dies of exposure.
- The owners of the house raise the baby as a Sex Slave.
Please, kind sir, won't you take this child back with you to Doorstop Baby?