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Dick Wolf, what have you done? Crime shows, we're now being told, are to blame for people's overeating and overspending. The likes of Law and Order, CSI, and Cold Case, with their unrelenting stream of random homicides, remind viewers of their mortality. This, says a study from the Journal of Consumer Research, triggers a desire to shop and eat, in order to somehow guard against your lifeless body being discovered by a dog walker in Central Park, and all your family and co-workers being placed under suspicion, until the real perp is fingered around 38 minutes later. So what this really means, in fact, is the marriage of two treasured American traditions: primetime entertainment about vicious crime and brutality, and obesity and debt being totally not our fault!