When thinking about African psychology nuance is warranted, and distinctions have to be made with respect to how individuals are oriented towards Africa and psychology. The major distinction to be drawn turns on the centre of gravity of your work as a psychologist in Africa. We need to differentiate between Euroamerican-centrists on the one hand and Africancentrists on the other.

The two categories of African psychologists can also be called scholarly extraverts and scholarly introverts – terms adapted from the work of Paulin Hountondji (1987). These terms do not refer to personality. Scholarly extraverts look to the theories and models and problems arising in the global north to guide their ontological, epistemological, methodological and technical interests. Scholarly introverts look to the experiences and realities, streets and paths in their countries for their ontological, epistemological, methodological and technical interests.