diff --git a/pandas/core/arrays/array_.py b/pandas/core/arrays/array_.py
index d17e508e3ca90..d037c7d69f964 100644
--- a/pandas/core/arrays/array_.py
+++ b/pandas/core/arrays/array_.py
@@ -209,7 +209,7 @@ def array(data,         # type: Sequence[object]
         return cls._from_sequence(data, dtype=dtype, copy=copy)
 
     if dtype is None:
-        inferred_dtype = lib.infer_dtype(data, skipna=False)
+        inferred_dtype = lib.infer_dtype(data, skipna=True)
         if inferred_dtype == 'period':
             try:
                 return period_array(data, copy=copy)
diff --git a/pandas/core/reshape/merge.py b/pandas/core/reshape/merge.py
index 5b22ebb7b469d..b4f650eb7b971 100644
--- a/pandas/core/reshape/merge.py
+++ b/pandas/core/reshape/merge.py
@@ -962,8 +962,8 @@ def _maybe_coerce_merge_keys(self):
             # object values are allowed to be merged
             elif ((lk_is_object and is_numeric_dtype(rk)) or
                   (is_numeric_dtype(lk) and rk_is_object)):
-                inferred_left = lib.infer_dtype(lk, skipna=False)
-                inferred_right = lib.infer_dtype(rk, skipna=False)
+                inferred_left = lib.infer_dtype(lk, skipna=True)
+                inferred_right = lib.infer_dtype(rk, skipna=True)
                 bool_types = ['integer', 'mixed-integer', 'boolean', 'empty']
                 string_types = ['string', 'unicode', 'mixed', 'bytes', 'empty']