General terms:
* Character development: This refers to the overall process of creating and revealing a character's personality, motivations, and relationships throughout a story.
* Character portrayal: This encompasses all the techniques an author uses to present a character to the reader.
* Character construction: This emphasizes the deliberate crafting of a character with specific traits and qualities.
Specific techniques:
* Direct characterization: The author explicitly tells the reader about the character's traits and qualities. This can be done through narration, dialogue, or other characters' observations.
* Indirect characterization: The author reveals the character's personality through their actions, words, thoughts, and interactions with others. This allows the reader to draw their own conclusions about the character.
* Show, don't tell: This principle encourages authors to reveal character through action and dialogue rather than directly stating their traits.
* Archetypes: These are recurring character types found in stories across cultures, such as the hero, the villain, the mentor, etc.
* Stereotypes: These are oversimplified and often negative generalizations about groups of people. Authors can use stereotypes to create specific impressions of characters, but it's important to be aware of the potential for harmful generalizations.
Ultimately, the term you choose depends on the specific aspect of character creation you want to emphasize.